Ash Wednesday and Lent

by Ed Sanders

We partied for five straight days and nights
until the morning
of the smeared ash

I fell upon my flood-scarred knees
by the spot where everything had washed away

I begged the Earth for forgiveness
Beseeched the Sky for lengthened moments
Importuned the Milieu for just a hint of Spirit.

And then somehow I felt a flow of bliss
it only lasted for 30 minutes,
but I knew it would come again

again again again
on the day of the ashen skin above the lids

when my aluminum boat
would no longer have to be used
even among the Spirits

and my children would always believe in their
daddy and mommy and the Egyptian Sun Boat
would always transverse the water to escape the Snake

Seven Wednesdays & then the third day when
the two sad Marys once came to the
cave of the rolling rock.

No matter how much we gambled
demanded the women pull up their dresses
drank absinthe and sprayed gold paint on our dongs

the fingers of those forty days
of penance and charity
still ran themselves within where we think
—the place where our grandmothers were sure eternity sang

and now where we’ll be alone in the fullest commixture
of everything that ever was in the Ever