Ash Wednesday Stanzas

From a Folgers can onto a cold acre 
Of Vinton County regrowth my uncle
Scattered his dad. He claimed a sprinkle, 
An errant paternal flake, had taken
To wind then found the slot between his Stroh’s 
And his throat as he swigged a farewell toast.
That beer, he said, was smokier than most. 
Must’ve tasted sweet enough, too, to chase 
With the rest of the case, wasted on absence,
Drunk on lack, the charred zest of loss. The drinks 
Filled him for years, till like a failed phoenix
He burned himself to fit a few empties 
Emptied by his son on that same cold oak 
Regrown when the smelting went up in smoke.

Saint Francis of Assisi sprinkled ash 
On every meal before he ate it, 
Like some fierce ascetic Mrs. Dash. 
Why? To mortify the palate?
Flagellate the buds? He buttered his bread
With ash, stirred ash in soups, ashed his hash browns, 
With vinegar and ash dressed his salad,
And had his eggs ash side up with a soupçon 
Of ash for good measure—
As though partaking of any common pleasure 
Required, for a true sample of heaven,
A tincture of extinction.

Starting today I’ll slide the smudge 
From brow to tongue for a tinge 
Of a condiment scorched
From every bridge I’ve torched; 
To savor, too, a scintilla of soot
From the ever-smoking gun my poor foot 
Has felt no relief from; to lick
My despair and know its flavor: snuffed wick. 
I’ll make of it an inverse Eucharist,
One that conjures every ordinary Christ 
I’ve left smoldering in Gethsemane.
Every innocent I’ve fed into the chimney.

Some years ago I met a man who’d eaten 
A life-scorching porridge of Pikesville Rye 
And Tylenol. I didn’t ask him why;
My job those days was to sit and listen. 
Before I could brew a bromide to speak 
He told this story. The previous week, 
A few days after he had laid to rest
His infant boy, he woke in a cold sweat
And drifted, in the midnight dark, red-eyed, 
Delirious, down the stairs directly
To the mantel on which the tiny urn lay.
And then, he confessed to me at his bedside, 
Get this . . . I licked my finger . . . dipped it in . . . 
I licked the ashy tip to taste my son.

Read more from Issue 20.1.