Barbara Hamby: Ode to the Sacred Heart of Everyone, Including You and You and You

Hey, Catholics, what is it with that red heart out there
beating on Jesus’ chest like some Frankenstein
experiment gone bad, Mary, too, and them acting like
everything’s okay, when it’s so not as if being crucified
weren’t bad enough not to mention the crown of thorns,
but that horror movie heart surrounded by fire,
well, I know you’re trying to say something but what?
It’s like wearing your heart on your sleeve
but an extreme-sport-100-mile-run-from-Miami-to-Key-West
version, like when you are twenty and have given
your heart to a moron and expect him to be Einstein,
well, not him, but a little smarter than average,
and he is not. As Celia says to Orlando-mad Rosalind
in As You Like It, “It is as easy to count atomies
as to resolve the propositions of a lover,” and Jesus,
your lovers have got to be one of the wildest
bunch ever, from St. Augustine to Jerry Falwell,
and the women, too, St. Agatha being number one
on my hit parade, and her ersatz boyfriend, Quintianus,
the Roman counsel, who was not happy
with Agatha’s cold shoulder, so he sent her to a brothel
for a month and cut off her breasts, but St. Peter
came and healed her wounds, although that didn’t stop
Quintianus, who threw her naked on burning
coals, but she was saved by an earthquake, still praying
to God to end her torture, and Renaissance
painters loved to show those detached boobs, just as they
loved to show St. Lucy holding her eyes
on a plate, St. Catherine with the wheel that pulled
her apart, well you get the picture, so I guess
the hearts pumping away on Jesus’ and Mary’s chests
are part of the same package, but wait, I just saw
Mary with a crown and six or seven swords piercing
her bosom, and that’s got to hurt, plus all the mess,
but I’m getting off subject here, which happens
a little too often for my tastes, but what can
you do, especially when the world is so wacky,
and religion is très bizarre as the French
have it, and Agatha died in peace, but Quintianus,
who knows, he probably bought a farm
and grew grapes and thought he was a pretty good guy,
but he deserved to have a half dozen swords
sticking out of his chest, as opposed to Mary, who was
minding her own business when God did what?
That’s a question that no one seems to be able to answer,
especially Jesus, since he was less than a baby
at the time, and don’t you think we should all
be wearing our hearts pinned to our jackets,
not the real ones, but beautiful replicas, like the Tin Man
in The Wizard of Oz, because we all have a heart,
though some people make you wonder with their guns
and border walls, so think about your sacred hearts
all of you, I was going to say dumbasses, but that’s not
really appropriate language for a poem,
especially one that’s skirting around the borders
of religion, though I’m with Chekhov, who said
My holy of holies is the human body and freedom
from violence and lies, which sounds pretty
beautiful to me, but like Chekhov’s characters
we lie to ourselves every second we’re alive,
as when scarfing a piece of cake, I say, “I have a sweet tooth,”
but that cake’s going directly to my ass,
so a little closer to the truth would be, “I have a sweet
ass,” which my husband has said on occasion,
but who knows what the truth is, and since the asses
are piling up here, I might as well call in
the most famous ass of all, Bottom the Joiner, who
was translated by a drop of fairy nectar,
and that’s what I need right now or some microdots
of acid, but who knows where that might
lead—oh hell, who knows where it all leads, but I love a trip,
so let’s catch the train to nowhere and see where we end up.
 

Copyright 2021 Barbara Hamby. From Holoholo (2021, Pittsburgh).

Barbara Hamby was born in New Orleans and raised in Honolulu. She is the author of seven books of poems, most recently Holoholo (Pitt, 2021). She has also edited an anthology of poems, Seriously Funny (Georgia, 2009), with her husband David Kirby. She teaches at Florida State University where she is Distinguished University Scholar.