~THEA S.KUTICKA~

AT THE DEPARTMENT OF MOTOR VEHICLES DIVISION

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Jesus, let me have the courage to donate my organs.
It is a selfish thing to not check this box.
Let me do this for once without hesitation, without need
for eyes in the afterlife, for lungs, for feet, for heart.

If it is reincarnation I believe in, forgive me
for wishing death so soon and by disaster.  Hurricane,
car crash, drowning.  Forgive me for not taking care
of this body, for not returning home to wash and dress

my father's wounds.  With faith I would pin milagros,
wishes for miracles on wooden statues.  A copper leg
to mend my father's feet, a silver heart to cure
mother's murmur.  Jesus, it has been too long

since I have seen them.  Forgive me for seeing Mary
as a kaleidoscope of color in the stained glass
windows of small town churches I have passed.
If I could see devotion it too would resemble a pattern.

It would be as clear and spontaneous as swifts
moving like a spot of oil across a watery sky.
So be quick about it.  Pack my organs in ice,
swab my body with oil, and light me on fire.

I'll rise above the dividing lines of the highway
and funnel in expert abandon with the swifts, those lovers
of industry, of flue and chimney.  I'll finally join
the faithful in a mass instinctual flight home.
 
 

© by Thea S. Kuticka