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Guilt

I have no vulture sins, God,That overhang my sky, To climb, grey-feathering the air,And swoop carnivorously.  It’s just the tiny sins, God, That from memory appear Like tedious buzzing flies to dartLike static through my prayer. 

Death

Death is the great forget, they said,A mindless, restful leaving Of all consciousness and careIn a vast unweaving.  And so I waited, cramped and still,For approaching Death to bringForgetfulness—but all he broughtWas a huge remembering.

Ritual

Why ritual? May I not receiveChrist without burialBy water? If I remember That He bled, If I believe, What need for Sacramental bread?  Only this I know: All cries out For form — No impulse Can rest Until somehow It is manifest. Even my spirit, Housed in heaven,Was…

Creation

God may have his presencein silence only, made so that a man may have space and timeto make himself himself.Whatever is is lost — but the unmade silencesteach hope, and possibility,and all the virtues God gave men to make gods…

Faith

Sacramental hours cross this chapel of infinity where the arch of the brain dreams horror.And no one comes. Within the waiting shadows the silence says wait: the darkness is a piece of a piece in the rapture of even being. But no…

Mormonism and the American Way: A Response

Let me begin by congratulating the editors and founders of Dialogue for their intellectual daring and integrity in the handling of this journal. And I want to thank them for inviting considered commentary on my…

Each Sect the Sect to End All Sects

It is not only refreshing in itself but also an occasion for rejoicing by all serious students of American religious history that Mario S. De Pillis is recalling our attention to the historical study of…