The Rubbish Of The World Poem by José Tolentino Mendonça

I have friends who pray to Simone Weil
For many years now I've noticed Flannery O'Connor

Prayer must be like those things
we say to someone who's sleeping
we have and don't have hope
only beauty can come down and save us
when the barriers are lifted
allowing images, noises and spurious
sediments to become part
of the magnificent
pageant on top of the ruins

Those who pray are like beggars of last resort
deeply rummaging through the emptiness
until that emptiness bursts
into flame inside them

St. Paul explains it in the First Letter to the Corinthians,
"we are the rubbish of the world to this very day",
a citation that Flannery kept at her bedside.

Translation: 2006, Richard Zenith