(but the choir director insists i stay one more moment)
for Mr. Charlton
outlooking an empty church parking lot / smoke unbridled / wander ears through fuzzy / quiet into distant choir – HAIL MARYs practiced / echoed with a mystical non-committance / a GLORIA while the orange yolk / glow of 6:30 PM burns / away blue sky into black evening / they don’t clap or stomp / limb desires stillness until SUNDAY / energy staved until divine things strike / when pressed coffee beans and sugar cubes / and glowing morning dustmites and mint green gowns / and the quiet intoxication / of abnegated passions / creates a sublime totality on velvet red rows / high above where laypeople sit / enjoying in spiritual revue / holding something honest / high, higher still / full of light / and god’s life.
but for now / it’s a WEDNESDAY night / so i must submit / to this grueling shift / so i must surrender / to the chunky brick and / my backpocketed / rolled stupor of / smoke and subduction / becoming a doll for the / totality of a hungrier / more honest god.
Jasmine Tabor is a writer from the deep south. She is a Mellon Mays Graduate Fellow, a recipient of the Edith A. Hambie Poetry Prize from Spelman College, and received her MFA in poetry from Syracuse University. Her works appear in Poets.org, Michigan Literary Review, Agnes Scott Literary Journal, among others. Jasmine is the author of the chapbook Mirror Myths (Bottlecap Press, 2024) and a 2021 Best of the Net award nominee. She served as Salt Hill Journal’s editor-in-chief in 2022, was a Stove Works resident and Meacham fellow in 2023, and in 2024 was the Vermont Studio Resident. She currently lives in Charleston, SC revising her first manuscript and working on her second.
