“There, in the company of widows and virgins
she (Catherine of Siena) performed good
works
and entreated the Lord
to let her atone for her
family’s failure to
understand.”
--A.J.
Dunning Extremes
It could be harder
than this. At least my fasting
is neither complete nor permanent, but a
sporadic
rush of lusting for marshmallows, for whipped
cream, milk—
anything white and radiating purity.
With heart-felt
repentance I return to the visions
of holy reformations, of floating thin and
unencumbered
as a wafer through my bedroom.
My body is a letter
written to my family
the way Catherine of Siena’s was a letter to
the Pope.
The same onion
parchment; brittle-thin, pleasing
to God who surely is sick of my family’s
debauchery.
If only I had
Catherine’s devotion, could whip
my back raw, starve for days on end, euphoric
with visions of Christ. How powerful
my words could be if they were sewn up
inside my tongue, and I, so removed from the
world
that even this husk of skin—of sin—can’t hold
me.
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