John's Bloody Apocalypse

Turning forty, he found Jesus'
late-night charlatans
peddling salvation

four hoary horsemen to smite
anyone and every

one who'd done him wrong.

I was I supposed
Exhibit A.

He seemed so certain
he almost had me fooled
until I tweaked

the grifter's bulge
surreptitiously tucked
inside the leopard skin jacket--

this red faced proselytizer was dealing
a marked deck. He'd pulled

the aces.

Still,
I enjoyed sparring

the olfactory debate of
brimstone and incense
swirling, being perched
on the edge of coming
to blows.

Like a couple of cagey heavyweights
trading quotation for
quotation,

probing
heterodoxic
inconsistencies.

In better times we might have
adjourned the joust
to the nearest victualer

lifted spirits

but the end of days doesn't countenance
backsliding transgressors.

He'd no space that fit
my way of thinking.

I'd lost my patience
on the book of revelations.

Ken e Bujold

© 2022   

Reviews

[Montag]

In most of your poems I feel I could be reading a pre-20th century writer (which I mean as a compliment since it takes talent to achieve this effect). I'd say you're my favorite poet on this site.

Two questions:
1. Have you ever spent time at sea? You write very convincingly of it.
2. Care to comment on the metaphor in this poem of the marked deck with aces pulled?

[Ken e Bujold]

at sea, non metaphorically, no. But I have spent a great deal of my life wandering this great planet of mine.
Sometimes simply for pleasure, other times not. And I am married to a woman who gave up living in her beautiful country to come to join me, so I have the perspective of that to draw on as well.

As to your second question: a simple read would be what it suggests, a crooked card player playing with a deck of removed aces up his sleeve. On another level, a little deeper read might be that of the all too casual attitude a great many religious zealots have "I have found the light, I know the way" but when you call them on it, they're real knowledge of their holy books is sparse, they like to cite the talking points, but pass over any you might throw back in rebuttal.

As for the great tip of your cap of my being your favorite, I don't know what to say, other than thank you very much. From the bit I've read of your work, I can honestly say that I regard you as a very serious slave to the art as well.
Ken e

[Crowley]

Ha!! Clever. nothing like a great debate over beliefs until you realize that changing a mind is less possible than pushing a twenty ton builder up the side of a mountain. And Revelations, that apparently tacked on scare tactic never made sense especially in light of the date and circumstance of canonization. Great Piece!

[Ken e Bujold]

thanks Crowley. I'm sure you are like me and had the pleasure of such conversations. Starts out fun enough, tweaking the nose of a new born zealot, but then it always ends the same, I know my scriptures as well as you do, but apparently we're reading different books

[William Michael Reeves]

I think I'll need to turn to a dictionary to properly review this. My first thought went to the original use of tarot cards. Poets would try to 'out bard' each other in games of words in the 13th century. But your vocabulary caused me to stumble. Can't quite fit into these thoughts.

[Ken e Bujold]

don't fret the vocab. just collect and gobble them up for a rainy day. The poem itself is a fairly straightforward send-up of what happens when 2 old friends agree to disagree on religion

[W. Barrett Munn]

This is quite marvelous, Ken. I think if we coupled "John's Bloody Apocalypse" with "The Preparation" we would have told the story someone's life story. I did have to go the the dictionary on this one as I was unfamiliar with victualer, but then I like to add to my lexicon so kudos for that help,
Winston

[Ken e Bujold]

your welcome winston and I agree with the idea of someone's life story.
Glad to add to the lexicon. It's a word you're likely to hear more in the UK among literary types lol