i’ve been dying since i was 16

maybe it was before that. i think i was 6 actually. inside a pew. inside a church. catholic, they say i am. i say it too - its just something i do.

but i died, yes. when i saw all the sculptures. all the plaques with the man. the thorn crowned man with nails in his hands and nails in his feet and blood on his head.

no tears though.

or sweat.

there shouldve been both.

wasnt he human?

i never knew jesus was god. i thought he was the son of. like my brother was to my dad.

he still is. both mine and jesus'.

ive never seen us in the same sentence but i should have because we've both been dead for so long.

i've been dying since i remember how sad i felt for his hands but especially his feet. i remember trying to measure with child sized hands how big that nail must have been. i shuddered at imaging how much it must have hurt him to feel it and maybe even hurt the hammerer trying to get the nails through the foot bone.

pain is loud, and i always felt for it. i also always was willing to take it. i cant tell you why. i did not grow up surrounded by pain. there was no lack of love. maybe that's why. maybe that's the problem. maybe thats always the fucking problem: i have lived my life afraid of the mere idea that somebody else in the world does not know love and it has made me die.

wait, maybe jesus, jesus, jesus, and i -

we are alike.

(dont tell god i said such a thing - i need to still make it to heaven to measure him up. measure both of them up. that father and that son)

i have been dying for such a long time but in all this time, nobody - not one - has come with a hammer to nail large nails through my bony hellbent feet.

i have been dying since i was young but my soul has gotten old waiting for some father and son to say, we've got a thorny crown for you.

maybe it's cause i'm no god but it's about time, in the history of heaven, that a goddess comes along.