Poem – Prayer Partners

I really shouldn’t share confessional poems like this one.

At the Laity Lodge artists retreat, I met Jeffrey Scott Guy, an artist and pastor out of Atlanta. He shared some of his art one evening. (In the poem, I describe Parable #7 and Baptism.)  Here is that conversation as I remembered it later in verse:

Prayer Partners

I need prayer, absolution, all that, but
I also need a bathroom. So I pee
in the stall next to an artist
whose oils I saw last night.
“Dude, I loved your art,” I say.
He doesn’t respond but we hear
each other’s water. “Especially,”
I say, “the one with the black tree
on the right.” He grunts acknowledgment
and I’m still peeing damn coffee.
“And the one with the red skulls.
My son would love that one.”
I wash my hands first, then grab
too many paper towels. “Thanks,” he says.

Tagged as: confession, Jeffrey Scott Guy, laity-lodge, poetry, Religion and Spirituality, Visual Arts