Tag Archives: reliquary

“Figure 7: Jesus Falls (2)” by Matthew Minicucci

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He lays prone on the smooth base,
         with left arm pulled back across his body.

Take this arm, he says,
         this hand.

This plaster cracked down the knucklebone.

It’s only symbol,
         symbolon,
                   that small thing which has been wrenched apart
                            we seek to put back together.
                                     Desperately.
Such disparity in our desperations.

If I were to compare this broken hand to yours
         if you signed my cast in blood,
                  or the wine I stole from the tabernacle,
                           would I be healed?

It is in this way we are asked to pretend

to take the body into our mouth
         but not to swallow;
                  to taste the blood and believe.

But I don’t believe.

This wine-dark liquid has no hand
         on the treacle and spit that filled my mouth after a fight

how it tasted like the snipped tin
         Chris dared me to eat off the floor of my grandfather’s shop.

Blood gathers these broken pieces, like sawdust
         spread on bile, and settles them
                  into the tender and cursory holes left behind.

It’s not that I don’t understand how
         different the sound is when the wound is ripped instead of cut;

or how the bruise turns
         from black to red when it breathes.

It’s that you fill this cup again
         and again from some glass carafe
                  and forget

that no one could ever believe in a blood that tastes so sweet.

–Matthew MiniCucci,
Reliquary, Accents Publishing

ReliquaryMore from Reliquary:

Matthew MinicucciMatthew Minicucci is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Illinois in Urbana, Champaign. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from numerous journals, including: The Gettysburg Review, The Southern Review, The Literary Review, Mid-American Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Cream City Review, and Crazyhorse, among others. He has also been featured on Verse Daily. He currently teaches writing at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois.

“Figure 6: Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus” by Matthew Minicucci

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Why are you kneeling?                                        Why have we both knelt?

Only in this way are we alike
            in stature and statuary.
                                                                                       We say drop or fall

when our knees touch
              the ground, like a stone from your palm,

but really we mean pulled
              a common center
                            an endless patch of dirt pocked by heels.

This place is smaller than the hairs on a nettle;
              each lonely in their sting and solitude.
                            Until now.
                                                                                       Believe me

when I tell you I’ve dreamt of this fabric
              a simple swatch of cloth held over a patch of violet flowers,
                            their papery bracts.

I think I understand now the worn path, the wine-dark
              of the sage flowers
                            that can’t help but grow.

Why do I look to their faces after seeing yours?

The oblong leaves;
              these split veins and inflorescent whorls.

                                                                                       What I mean to say is
                                                                                                     you’re both beautiful;

what I mean to say is sometimes
              we see a menorah in something as simple as sage.

–Matthew MiniCucci,
Reliquary, Accents Publishing

ReliquaryMore from Reliquary:

Matthew MinicucciMatthew Minicucci is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Illinois in Urbana, Champaign. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from numerous journals, including: The Gettysburg Review, The Southern Review, The Literary Review, Mid-American Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Cream City Review, and Crazyhorse, among others. He has also been featured on Verse Daily. He currently teaches writing at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois.

“Figure 5: Simon of Cyrene” by Matthew Minicucci

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ReliquarySo much like his name, Simon listens
           more than carries.

Jesus, with his hands open-palmed, pointed
           to the ground, shows each worn patch of skin.

Simon points a single index finger to the sky,
           proving lift,
                      exhibiting the fulcrum,
                                 this single moment of rest

on which the lever turns and moves
           some body, any body.

This is where I will go:
           up
                      when I learn to lift off one knee;

how to grip the smooth and scale
           these marble columns.

Sister Theresa pulls my hands from the statue,
           presses them together in prayer, fingers locked
                      and kept from the curved lids of Simon’s unpupiled eyes.

Here is the church; here is the steeple.

We show this architecture
           back and forth, how inside us
                      there are multitudes

but don’t dare uncoil our fingers.

Simon’s hands are the only not tied together by ropes;
           not carrying switch or sword.

And so he opens them to whatever might fall
           to the splintered and the split he sees with perfect clarity
                      despite his smooth eyes;
                                 these two dark clouds I couldn’t help but touch.

It’s always a son who falls, or is about to fall.

Take this burden from me; each of them says.
           Take this heavy wooden rain.

“He chooses this.” Sister Theresa says.
           “They ask and he answers.”

Such perfect reasoning
           in the soft hum of a drawn sword.

Take this, the metal sings. It belongs to one man no longer.

–Matthew MiniCucci,
Reliquary, Accents Publishing

More from Matthew Minicucci:

Matthew MinicucciMatthew Minicucci is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Illinois in Urbana, Champaign. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from numerous journals, including: The Gettysburg Review, The Southern Review, The Literary Review, Mid-American Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Cream City Review, and Crazyhorse, among others. He has also been featured on Verse Daily. He currently teaches writing at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois.

“Figure 4: Jesus Meets His Mother” by Matthew Minicucci

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Reliquary

This statue isn’t marble
          it’s ash;
                    so much the same except the fire beneath it.

What’s ash without fire?

The two figures ask this back and forth,
          but have no answer.

They would stand here forever
          if not for the heat; if not
                    for the grasp of the soldier’s lash.

“Imagine,” Sister Theresa says,
          “this is the last time you see your mother.” Imagine

if white hair
          could calm the warlike spirit.

Imagine that I place my index finger on Mary’s hooded head
          try to pull the veil back:

all that moves is me.

My mother was always a hooded figure
          her anger ash-like;
                    her heart a lingering ember.

The day she left, our driveway turned to dead sea
          more salt than water, where everything I threw in
                    refused to sink.

“This is the last time you see her,” Sister Theresa said
          but she was wrong.

She’ll be there as he waits to die; hidden face
          looking to his hooded heart.

And perhaps they’ll see each other.

Though, perhaps, he won’t be able
          to take his eyes off the western wall

how Jerusalem slips from the sun; palms
          stand like sentries, while leaves
                    wither to spikes.

Their separation from him is a measure of distance.

He prays to this distance.

–Matthew MiniCucci,
Reliquary, Accents Publishing

More from Matthew Minicucci:

Matthew MinicucciMatthew Minicucci is a graduate of the MFA program at the University of Illinois in Urbana, Champaign. His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from numerous journals, including: The Gettysburg Review, The Southern Review, The Literary Review, Mid-American Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Cream City Review, and Crazyhorse, among others. He has also been featured on Verse Daily. He currently teaches writing at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois.