<%@LANGUAGE="JAVASCRIPT" CODEPAGE="1252"%> Poetry by Houry

 


REDEMPTION

by LA Story Houry

 

I prayed, as THEY
Had instructed
Me to do.
“You can be one
of us if you pray,”
THEY told me.
So, I prayed within
The cinderblock cell
Walls of my prison
And I heard the stones
Move nightly, narrowing
My space, but still I prayed.

I heard the walls
Scrape closer until
My cot was crushed
And I slept and
Prayed standing
Sideways.
I prayed in wheezing
Whispers until my
chest collapsed
Then my prayer
Was formed only
In my mind.

I did not hear
My final scream
Or my skull crack
As my ears were
Pressed toward
One another.
Only after that
Did the walls
Retreat and THEY
-- the floaters --
Entered my cell
And anointed me.

They scraped the
Walls and put
My pieces in
A pile and anointed
Me with their holy
Oils and chanted
Their powerful
Novenas until
I moaned in
The sweet agony
Of redemption,
“I am new.”

 

 

© Houry, 2005

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L.A. Story Houry is a Southern writer who resides in north Mississippi. She is a freelance feature writer, an Associated Press Award-winning columnist for the Daily Corinthian (Corinth, Miss.), a poet and a writer of SciFi/Fantasy/Horror fiction. She takes her mad Southern heritage seriously, and enjoys every moment of her neuroses. She hopes a nervous breakdown will prove to be an interesting muse.