Years ago a choir director asked us what saints we would like to include in our sung litany. My response was Jack Kerouac. He didn’t make it. Here, then, a litany of writers:
Holy, holy, holy!
Holy the writers
Holy the written
Holy:
Saint Penny-a-Word
Charles Dickens
Slumming in London
Holy his cries of foul and shame
Holy:
Saint Walt Whitman
singing the body
electric
Holy his multitude of selves
stretched across America
Holy:
Saint Emily Dickinson
in her infinity
of rooms, changing
and charging
language
Holy, and have mercy on us,
Saint Eugene O'Neill
martyr to family,
and terrible memory
Holy:
Saint Henry Miller
embracing everything
because everything was
Holy!
Saint Anais Nin
patroness of dream
Holy!
And have mercy on us,
Saint Jack Kerouac
Holy Jack
who suffered and died
a skid-road
mountain-top
word-drunk
Franciscan Bohdisatva
Sancte:
Santo Pablo Neruda
whose heart
held his country
and whose lyrics
encircled the world
Sancte:
Santo Victor Jara
whose hands
were a-blazing
Holy, and have mercy on us,
Saint Allen Ginsberg
Holy
Queer
Hindu -Bu-Jew
whose crazy wisdom touched us all
Holy:
Saint William Seward
Junky Queer Burroughs
who devoured the Naked Lunch
looked into the abyss
saw the Wild Boys
the centipedes
the assassins;
Holy Bill Burroughs
Winking at blood-soaked time
and wrapping his last breath around
Love!
Holy the writers
who wrap their breath
around
Love!
Holy the writers
Holy the written
and have mercy on us!
Monday, May 18, 2009
