Kabrakan and Zipakna Discuss Theology

So, there he was,
his eyes wide and pupils dilated,
a shriek rising in his stuttered throat,
indentations deepening in the leather Bible
clutched in his white-knuckled hands.

The seeming certainty of our deaths loomed closer
as the floor pitched and rolled and glass shattered
and one woman screamed high-pitched terror.
Another clutched her whimpering child
closer to her protective, eternally safe bosom,
and softly murmured reassuring words into his ear.

My sense of detachment came from a confidence
that this tremor would pass
and we were not bound for the abyss.
Even if we were, I wondered,
why does this man of God stink of fear?
What does that say about his faith?

Then the shaking abruptly stopped.
The one woman gasped for air,
her screeching having emptied her lungs,
and the man feebly pronounced,
"Praise the Lord!"

The mother gently spoke to an upturned face,
"There, I told you it would be all right!"

Mother, I thought, your calm at the doorstep of doom
sings hosannas! No pulpit or alter
offers sanctuary as sound as your caress
and no faith in this room is as strong as your arms.

I knew then that were God to speak to me,
Her voice would be the voice of my mother.

Anger Management

The hardest part
is coming face to face,
truly, with no guile
or misdirection, or excuses,
especially excuses,
with this anger that wells
deep within my chest.
So few here have integrity,
so few anywhere
and it galls, rubbing till
the soul is blistered and oozing.
Right. Wrong.
These are questions for the mirror,
the eyes staring back.

The Missionary's Promise

What solace is it to that child,
the one with the belly distended
from starvation,
that God so loves him
He has chosen him to suffer
flies drinking at the corners of his eyes?
What joy in God's love
is the child's mother feeling
as her hungry babe finds no milk
in her desert breasts?
What doxology can be sung
when you have no strength to shoo
the vermin that feed on you
while you yet live?
Ahh, the blessing is to come
for these meek souls
when their hunger has shrunk them
so they can pass through the eye of the needle,
and God with thank them for their patient faith
with eternity.
This, then, is God's promise, His reward
for enduring
and not waving Him away
as He drinks from the well of the soul
in the corners of their eyes.

About the 9 11 poem

There are a number of terms within this poem you may not recognize:
Shaitan (Satan) is from Arabian mythology. It is a type of djinni (genie) created by Allah, is evil, eats dirt and excrement, and serves only to lead humankind into sin by temptation, creating illusions, visions of pleasures to be had by committing sins. The promise of 70 virgins in heaven becomes a little clearer with this understanding, doesn't it?
Abzu is the primeval waters of creation. Also the Sumerian deity of underground waters.
Enki is a creator god; god of wisdom; god of sweet water, worshipped in Summeria and Iraq 3500 BC to 1750 BC.
All djinni loathe salt and water.
Sources for this information are:
A Field Guide to Demons by Carol K. Mack and Dinah Mack; Henry Holt and Company, New York
Encyclopedia of Gods by Michael Jordan (no, not the basketball player); published by Facts on File Inc., an Infobase Holdings Company, New York

9 11 and other atrocities

At first my anger was such
that I stabbed at the air with clenched fists
and cursed.
"There is no healing for this!" I shouted,
"only vengeance, and retribution!
Only fire from the sky!"
My rancor grew and my imprecations expanded.
"Burn all that flame will caress!
Poison the waters so they cannot slake their thirst!
Salt the fertile ground so their babies will whimper
with the distended belly of starvation!
We will wrench these Shaitan from their unholy jijad
and cast them into the Abzu
to lie groveling for mercy at the feet of Enki!"
My anger spent, I stood panting,
sweat streaming down my temples,
a horror rising in my gorge at the thought
that I would wish these awful punishments
to fall upon children, upon innocents.
There, I understood, is where hatred finds
its supposed righteousness,
where the djinni finds escape from his confining bottle.
Tonight I will sleep with salt beneath my pillow
and make my supplication in the name of Allah
to show me the way to vanquish these demons
whirling from the desert sand,
without becoming one of them.