A holy season

 

A Holy Season

.

It is a holy season.

Cruel winds

shrill at the corners

scrub my face raw.

I hear a choir

dying in every gust.

.

It is a holy season.

Ragged chanting

from the perennial faithful

to celebrate birth.

.

It is a holy season.

Merciless children

torment the purses

of betrayed mothers,

extracting promises

like teeth.

.

It is a holy season.

Her head rests

blind

on my shoulder

leaking tears.

Her dead breath

is captured

in my curls.

.

It is a holy season.

I will undress it,

blue-fingered torture

from collar

to spine.

.

It is a holy season.

Licking thin lips

fresh with the taste

of salt and blood.

.

It is a holy season.

The meek

dream of inheritance

while the mighty

steal the shirts

from their backs.

.

.

© the author writing as Romantic Dominant

Written during a bitter winter long ago when I lost my heart, my words, and the last tattered remnants of faith – in religion, in politics, in big business. In the time since I wrote this the rich have become far richer all over the world. And much more skilled at lying, cheating, bullying and stealing. Hence Trump, Johnson and many others.

It has become a ritual for me to post this every year. An antidote to the commercialism and tacky sentimentality that the season swims in.

photograph borrowed from diginoobsi