We Both Thought We Were Christ Poem by Seif-Eldeine O

We Both Thought We Were Christ

She was a trembling cathedral in blue gloves. A charlatan prophet. A tinfoil hat that talked like scorched stone, a screeching blade that cut stocks of corns for Hebrews. We were the ordinary din, her disciples or her anti-Christs. Her angels or her devils. We were the ones that sowed or the ones that reaped. I entered the cave of her dwelling. There in that dwelling, I would wait to bless the pilgrims. I was oblivion of sin. A refugee king. An executioner of pain and a plague of love. The one that never strays but vanishes, the one that returns, the executioner, the plague, a refugee king. Was it I who was love and her hate? Or were we both? Or we were neither? Trembling cathedrals vanishing in the night, charlatan prophets, the babies of tinfoil hats and screeching blades.

originally published in Oddball Magazine, Oct.6 2015