Logos Poem by Michael Buhagiar

Facing my bed in the peaceful room
Of my grandparents’ brick suburban home
A painted smiling Jesus hung,
As salves so many a Catholic’s doom.
A bearded young man, haloed gnome,
To the wall and my gaze serenely clung.

His chest, exposed in bloodless surgery,
The Sacred Heart showed, ensconced in flame,
While two paling fingers to the sky were held
As the King and Priest in closest amity.
Around the crescent base of the oval frame,
‘The Lord is my Salvation’ was starkly spelled.

Well, though only a pup, I clung to that bone:
That monster ‘-ation’, how might I speak?
O fruit that hangs on the groaning tree,
Or in the fabled ark lies carved in stone,
In labouring waves the near light you seek
From the silent page, which gave life to me.