Heaven wasn't as perfect as he thought it would be
It wasn't the music
Every harp was tuned and playing high rhapsodies
The cherubim and seraphim
Were more than polite

The father agreed
Jesus had changed
Since his return from earth
Shadows hid in his sleeves
Dark worries, memories
A restless need
To be in two places at once

I'll give you forty more days, said the father
Jesus took the form of the sunset
And struggled through the seas
To the shores of Galilee

The first night he saw no one
He counted sands lit by moon
Touching each grain tenderly, like prayer beads
Until the morning cleared

Winds stormed his hair
A pulse thundered through the main artery
And pulled him towards Magdalene
Mary of tattoos
Mary of man's desire
To live for the flesh

She sat at a window, hands folded
Eyes, soft brown earth plowed and fallow
The merchant was gone, an alabaster jar left behind

Mary, what have you done? Jesus asked
She looked away, covering her shoulders
I was lonely master, you left me

Jesus held her hand
The lines of their palms touched
Through to the night of the fortieth day
And he rose again
Alone
Over branches swayed with ripened fruit
Above rain clouds
Past the fickle moon
To the right hand of the father
Waiting
For Mary to join him
Waiting for Mary
To die

Dawn arrives
Unnoticed
And falls to his knees
Beside her bed

Magdalene lies
Marble still lips blue
Breasts cold as coins

He moves up her legs and thighs
And he mounts her

She does not move
Nor feel
The touch of morning light

She came to
On the far side of night
In an ancient world

Where women gather secrets, bunches of black daisies
Petals fall

"He loves me, he loves me not, he loves me, he loves me not
The chorus chanted

She knew the lines by heart
The paradox by heart

But she could not place the petals with the faces

The ones who loved to love her
The ones who loved to hate her
And the ones who hated to love her

The women begged the harlot to tell
She tried to remember
They all blurred together in
Too many drinks of August wine

The One who came to mind
Never touched her
Never came close

While other men filled her with unredeemed vigor
He would watch her from the cave where incense rose
Praying, "Father, deliver me from this world of flesh."

He was always with me
Biting my breast through another man's teeth
Moaning my lovers' moans,
Tasting sweat

He hated himself for being a man
He hated himself for not being a man

The woman nodded and laughed
Yes, we know Jesus, and each one told her story