Breadcrumb #658

CLAIRE ZAJDEL

there’s something about the way i’ve been, 
loving everyone and feeling empty 
‘i don’t feel good when i give—’
i tell my spiritual guide (companion, 
she’d correct me)
‘why?’ she cocks her head just so
(this is not how it should go, 
we are Catholic) 
I pause, hoping for her better answer, 
something other than self-loathing, because
i’m sure how to change that. 

the world sells self-care six ways to Sunday
but it won’t meet you in the pew, 
where the Monstrance stared at you, 
the Holy Eye, that Friday you kneeled and felt
nothing and maybe knew why. 

the Trinity — You and Them and 
Me. 
i kneel before You, i feed Them, 
and destroy myself. original sin 
always breaks in somewhere. 

‘I am not enough—
’‘none of us is,’ a friar says as i confess
my annihilation. ‘incompleteness gives
God and His people the space to
fill us. 
imperfection 
is what allows us to be loved.’ 

‘ask Him,’ another priest suggests, 
yet another reconciliation, (pray for
the knees of the scrupulous) 
‘ask Him to show you how to love
yourself 
the way He does.’ 

so i wait, patient and impatient, alternately, 
for love to pervade— 
in His way— 

and inhabit this place.

• • •