Poetry

Grassy Branch Pentecostal Church, exhalations

One more time, Brother Albion draws
the tank-air through his oxygen hose
and rubber mask. He preaches, shape us
on the potter’s wheel, he grunts,
he creaks like a rusty gate.
Mansions there, glorified bodies—ah.
He does that for you, you lean forward,
you amen, his words are as honeycomb,
as morels you reach for in the rich damp
of a decaying log. One more time,
the spirit gives him wind.