Churched

By JESS RICHARDS

image of heart on slate

Divided Heart: painting on slate, Jess Richards 2014.

 

Wellington, New Zealand

Stained light shines on breath-less angels
who occupy a stone heaven-on-earth without living for touch
without having felt another human enfolding them against soil.
Only the winged can lift themselves so high
but freeze half-way to the clouds
locked in cold bodies, solo-flight paused.
A position of clasping and gazing only up or down—
they must pray and kill with those clean slab-hands
while alongside them are people they can’t even see.
Inside a stone book with block-pages there are so many lists:
how many new orphanages are to be built
how many fresh graves are to be dug.
And how many humans claim their coldest decisions belong to god
while secretly yearning for the warmth of a hollow womb.

 

Jess Richards is the author of three novels: Snake Ropes, Cooking with Bones, and City of Circles, all published by Sceptre in the UK. She also writes short fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry; many of these have been published in various anthologies. She is currently working on a creative nonfiction project on the theme of birds and ghosts. Originally from Scotland, Jess now lives in Wellington, New Zealand, with her wife and two cats.

Churched

Related Posts

Dispatch from Camelback Mountain

CHRISTOPHER AYALA
There is a part of me who everyday thinks of being back in Arizona walking around blistering days, laughing how when I had them to myself, I had thought this was the end of the line, that there had never been a worse place on earth. That’s mid-thirties type clarity.

In fall, the persimmon trees light their lanterns

CHRISTY TENDING
And I plunge my foot into the scalding water, dropping my resistance to its intensity. I move toward it, inward. I move fast so that my body is unable to register the purposeful heat this place contains—something primordial, obscured by a white, industrial exterior.

Water Shrine

ANGELA SUCICH
Everywhere, those half-full bottles, the real offering. / Dusty, or clear and bright, transparent skin flashing / sunlight. A monument heavy with water. A shrine / to reclaim the disposable.