Hail Mary

How's your faith these days
Father...
Does it lie dead, forgotten,
dismembered;
the masticated pieces
spat at the feet
of your stained glass Gods,
choking your private sanctuary
with the stench of
decaying hope and rotting promises?

How's your faith these days
Father...
Does it hang heavy, cold against
the collar,
a bloodstone Rosary strung on
veins of attrition;
confessions sold in confidence
to cast the Judas cross
in tarnished silver, buffed in repentence.

How's your faith these days
Father...
Does it have the sweet persuasion
it once had,
or has the hypnotic drone of
the comforting doggerel
lost its melodic allure?

Or is it all finally
a figment of the contrite collective masses,
blind moths drawn to fat candles,
lit by weary wanderers here
to illuminate the path
to salvation.
How's your faith these days
Father...