By Andrea Munroe
Featured in Caesura 2020: Imago
Childish
The puppet show pastor brings out old Peter again, his mouth a marionette grin, his morals of patience and faith, and his Jesus all but a prop, for the handler had not enough hands and someone needed to be the ocean. This was my gospel.
The paper doll manger scene,
where the wise men come too early,
the date is December 25th,
and Aryan Jesus is one with the hay-
the sheep somehow serenade
and someone let in a boy with a drum?
This was my frustration.
The music cried shrilly to its imagined heaven,
choruses striving for sentiment,
words decisively young-faithed,
the beat informing me more than the rhymes,
and the helpless plaid hipsters raising hands
because they never truly understand.
This was my complaint.
“My child,
dear broken one,
Love is louder than song and speaker,
Grace is stronger than agenda,
and Christ is greater than cross.
So tell me, lost soul,
could you show me the meaning of mercy?
Of love?
Could you count up your hours of service?
Of prayer?
What have you done with your knowledge?
Or have you yet learned it- at all?”
There is pride in legalism
but beauty in playtime’s sunshine.
Generations of daisies all the same
and sparrows sold for less than lunch,
God blesses with blooms and eyes and beauty
and reprimands softly, in whispers.
This is my confession, and simplicity is my new lesson.
Andrea Munroe is a freshman computer science major and Honors College student. She loves making people laugh and would rather watch the rain than do her math homework, although she often has to compromise between the two. In her spare time, she collects C.S. Lewis books and contemplates the fabric of the universe. She currently aspires to publish the book she has in the works.