There’s a temporary campground, with a tent,billowing-white, just off Sprague Ave. in Tacoma.
Keep your daughter home. Make popcorn with salt,buttery-warm. Let her watch the Wizard of Ozon channel 5. Skip the revival altogether as if the Circusnever came to town.
Shield her from the monkeys. Walk her through the flowers. Buy her ruby slippers, then tell her the truthand tuck her in.
Just don’t let her smell the sawdust, feel its itch on her innocent knees,or she’ll kneel before the preacher-god in the afterglow of his indecent
questions—
Are you washed in the blood? Are you salty, scarlet and scared? Will you come without one plea? Give alland surrender?
She’ll tremble in the spirit-stabbing guiltof original, uncommitted sin until she liftsher blameless arms in praise of her downfall.
Outside, in the dusty margins, tearsnot yet spilled, will mingle with manly moans.
Only the tent will be temporary. Only the preacher will be saved.
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Photo by Ben Hershey on Unsplash