Bingo Jesus

A shabby man, my creation
Whose baggy shadow dances jigs long forgotten
Whose Dreads seem under lit by multi-coloured neon
Who beams a smile that doesn’t pinpoint memory
His face a relief map
A bumpy wrinkled journey of everyone’s encounter with breath,
No stranger to death
Bored with the finite wisdom
Of the successful dim and distant world-weary.

It’s whispered he can speak in tongues
This son of me
But doesn’t have much to say
That he can walk on water
There’s no way he’d be reduced to parlour tricks
For poets and story-tellers
Hungry to be remembered.
He’s offended by the restrictions of longevity
And thinks immortality blinks for time wasters.

For Bingo Jesus
Holy Water is mentholated spirit
Spirit that makes the miracle lights gather
A firefly disco ether
Where he’s always one step ahead of the flautists
A favourite of tourists and children
Whose giggles he knows may one day mimic
The shortcomings of his chest.
He’s the best at this street theatre
Of polystyrene tea and sympathy
Of unintelligent bourgeois empathy
And broken tambourines.