Observations placeholder

Christopher Reid – Expanded Universes

In the small crowd
Gathered to watch
The mountebank’s scandalous
Last performance,
Two people –
A man and a woman –
Whose faith in him,
Far from being shattered,
Was roundly confirmed.

Detaching themselves
From the crowd’s sullen
And self righteous rhubarb
Of disappointment,
They left that dusty
Place and took
To the highways and byways
There to proclaim
The ‘good news’
As they insist on describing it.

For in their opinion
A miracle did happen;
The fellow did fly,
Just as he had said he would,
Rapturously rocketing
To some point in the sky
Of incalculable altitude,
Before seeming
To change his mind
And plunging back earthwards.

To illustrate
Their abstruse message
They have some bit
Of business with a stone
Or any handy object
Which they toss in the air
Telling you to fix
Your mind on the moment
When it stops and allows
Itself to fall.

I don’t believe
We need fear this cult,
One among so many
And lacking as it does
Either clear moral precepts
Or potent symbolism –
Some ingenious gimmick
Like, say, the cross.
But the usual precautions
Might still be in order.