April 8 - Dear Pope Francis

I see you’ve asked your
frocked crew to be more 

accepting of the queer

and the divorced
but still with no real change
in the dogma that has
destroyed lives beyond measure
be more tolerant you say
unjust discrimination against
gays and lesbians is
unacceptable you say
as though there were instead
a more just option to exercise
and hey what about the trans people
where do they fit in your kinder
gentler tapestry of Catholic

I remember when I was a kid
the heartbreak of my mom
when your team excommunicated
her from the one place that she
found peace and comfort
this church that meant so much
that gave her solace and helped
her hold all of the fragments into
which she’d been broken by the
hurt and horrors that had been her lot

I remember the rifle shot crack
of the screen door slamming shut
from our vantage point view
my brothers and me in a row
upon the sofa in our Sunday best
where she had left us just before
she tried to silence the awful pain
watching in terror as strange men
rolled her still and silent body
outside to the ambulance
and we knew not if we would
ever see her again

I remember when she came home
her broken was even more broken
but she still loved your damn church
in spite of being kicked out for
falling in love and marrying again
in her heart she stayed a member
of Team Catholic and all the rules
so she tried to pull me her queer kid
out by the roots pouring the lye of Jesus
into the fresh wounds she opened
with feverish and devoted regularity
until I was just as broken and broker
so I just gotta say Mr. Pope
Fuck You and your kinder gentler church

April 8, 2016