we were lugged inside
the sacristy,
swaddled and screaming,
then paraded
through the nave—
it was then we should've realized
that something
wasn't right:
how our truth
was a sin,
and our sin
was the truth;
that our bodies,
which were heretofore
made of perfect ratios
of fat and heat
and light
now felt constricted
inadequate, and tight—
while cold chrism,
drizzled listless
in those echoey rooms,
and the grave-like indifference
of their cold marble pools,
and the cruel, fearful symmetry
of responsorial tunes
repeating—
these ordeals ballooned
to a wretched eternity,
just the way
hell might.