Salvation and Dust
Each summer since 1920, the white tent
rises from the dust, its gleaming poles
polished smooth by sand carried
across a thousand miles.
For five nights, Mesquite Bend swells
with hymns and brimstone, whispered
promises of forgiveness, and Spirit-filled
prayers. Faith brings most who sit
in the stiff, folding chairs for hours
each night to listen to Reverend Grady
ebb and flow the Gospel for them,
sweat trickling down his bulbous nose
as he points in all directions, his words
full of holiness and damnation. Others
bring stubbornness with them,
the need to hold on to the self
outdoing the call to step out,
childlike, into the abyss where reason
gives way to belief. These few mock
the courage of those who freely fall
into the arms of the dry, hot air
that builds to a mighty crescendo
of cicada song and amens. The time
fifty souls returned to Jesus
even the mockers felt goose bumps
crawling up arms that raised heavenward.
In a landscape of darkness, these nights
shine between fields filled with cotton and coyotes.
Ramona Levacy
April 28, 2015
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