The Rags Of The Raptured (A.K.A: The Old One Three) Poem by Tony Jolley

He came back last week.
Seemed as if he’d changed his coat and his tune,
Having worn terribly,
And faded four or more shades the deeper
In tone and demeanour.

His silence had put on a few pounds
Since his acolyte audience
Had been raptured without him:
Translated at the metal angel’s last trump
From brown, down-at-heel, stick-in-the-mud
To gleaming, yellow-golden glory
And housed in one of the many mansions,
Prepared as promised,
Where the weather of the world
Would wear and weigh no more.

He alone was left in the landscape.
A Jean Baptiste, confused and crying voiceless in his wilderness;
Wordless against the wind
Now sweeping away the rags of the raptured
To rob him of even the faintest echo of his faithful service,
Helpless against a Nature who would no more nurture him.
He was become the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil
After the apple had been plucked:
A blameless metaphor for something once pure,
Now unimaginably wronged as much by Creator as created.
Condemned….. yes,
Yet never without consequence
In this world….
And maybe even the next.


(The third in a series of ‘Old One’ poems.)