Nude Christianity

Nude Christianity

A Poem by Tom Cook

when i was young i 
attended a small church in aid, missouri where
the mark twain forest rolled over a set of
farmlands and locked fingers with highway 60 and
the outskirts of dexter, missouri. if you ever been
to both, then you know
what it's like to feel reserved and enjoy
peace and quiet over a bottle of suds or
a fishing rod in your hand as the summer sun
painted the looming nighttime a bruising purple. 

i must have been seventeen at the time and
i found myself following a crush 
i had in high school. she was a little over five foot
with a great figure, most notably the shape of
her hips. i called her an onion butt, meaning
she had an a*s so good it brought tears to my
eyes. yet i loved her with the same 
infatuation that most adolescent boys 
in southeast missouri do. when i was a writer she
read one of my stories and told me she loved it
and when i attended my first school dance she
was the first girl i ever danced with.
it was nothing sexual, just a simple slow
dance, with arms on hips and shoulders, staring
at one another grinning from ear
to ear. comparing it to my first kiss, blowjob, or 
sex for that matter, it ranked above them
all, because it was all out of the endless well of
kindness in her heart.

she attended school in dexter later on, and played
basketball the year they won state. she was
the pastor's daughter and knew everyone at 
church so well she could recite the id number on 
their license and name off their favorite 
movies, songs, meals, books, magazines, even
sports. 

it came down to sports, if i remember correctly. 
we never dated, or kissed, held hands, cuddled.
we hugged on separate occasions, mostly out of
modesty and because someone had been
"saved". however i always felt close to her, like
a boyfriend or maybe more. 

there was a bulletin board with church 
announcements, and newspaper clippings from the
local newspapers. most of them were about 
the "youth" of the church, often being the 
dexter girl's basketball team. and during service, before worship
or after sermons, or even during them for that matter, we
would be enlightened on the basketball team's
progress. and everyone would applaud. 

i began to post newspaper clippings, regional stuff not
local s**t, about puxico's baseball team. i was the 
starting catcher, and we had won damn near 30 games
and marched to the district finals. 
it's silly to think about it, but at first i was 
vying for her attention, and then i found myself
wanting attention from the congregation. i wanted
them to mention the baseball team just
once before worship, or during the pastor's sermon, or even 
shake my hand after church and say, "gee tom, i hear
you puxico boys have been tearing it up this year."
i wanted to be seen and felt in that church the same
way as the pastor's daughter that i loved before i even
knew what love was. i wanted to be a somebody.

i never received any thanks or congratulations for
my team. what happened was i posted a picture the 
regional paper had taken of me. we won the game and i 
had made front page. when i came to church next
week, i found strands of the clippings flesh hanging from
the thumbtacks. it was wadded up and thrown in the 
trashcan. and in its place, as if to piss on its already 
desecrated grave, was a picture of the pastor's daughter
shooting freethrows. and all i could feel
was this crushing feeling that at first i thought
was her final goodbye from my life, but it wasn't it was
the weight of the pulpit and the pews and the
wayward shifting eyes who didn't have time for
a puxico boy. 

© 2012 Tom Cook


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A touching and very palpable piece, well done, good read.

Posted 11 Years Ago


Aww how sweet and sad. Are you still a religious Christian?

One small grammar clarification, though you may have done this as some sort of literary device: you used been in the first stanza without have or has. This is incorrect.

Ok, bro- ttyl. Good job.

Posted 11 Years Ago



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Added on June 10, 2012
Last Updated on June 10, 2012
Tags: nude, christianity, poem, me, i'm, sexy, drama, fiction, rhymes, no rhymes, beautiful

Author

Tom Cook
Tom Cook

Cape Girardeau, MO



About
My fiction has been published in the World of Myth, my body in Play-girl. I'm an editor for Wednesday Night Writes, please send me your stories, flash fiction, and poetry, I want you to know the wa.. more..

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A Chapter by Tom Cook