Joshua Jones
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five Shenandoah Studies
Yesterday they arrested
the faith healer in Jackson,
the one who clapped angel beats.
Pastor’s tongue lashed sickness
right out of any passer
no matter how well they looked.
My mother said he healed her
of arthritis she ain’t got
and isn’t like to get now.
*
Two weeks stuffed between hay bales
steeped him filthy as sin. Scuffed
up and bruised from jumping off
the tilting iron horse, he looked
near as poor as he was, but
I burned his drunk duds, dunked him
seven times, and scoured his skin
young with lye soap till the creek’s
rocks were sudsed like spring frogspawn.
*
Even when the house got oil
put in, he kept a fresh cut
cord stacked against the back wall
with a shovel for the snakes.
If the wood got waterlogged,
he’d toss out what wouldn't burn
and split enough to restock
the pile. He never roofed it.
Would have kept him from the axe.
*
In the turnip field the Friends
Church keeps upstream, turned up what,
with a little research, turned
out to be a cannon round
from the Late Unpleasantness.
The church women wanted it
thrown out—a killing symbol
and all—but were outvoted
for the need of a doorstop.
*
I walked north along the creek,
and it fell dark quick. I slept
pillowed on a rock I plucked
from the bank. I’d never tell
the preacher this, but I saw
the mountain serrated like
a fish scaling knife and dead
folks wandering up and down
the edge looking for heaven.
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