Dear Reader,
I am currently working on my next poetry book, Driving North, and I want to share with you one of the poems that may make its way into this collection.
Matt Talbot was an Irish ascetic. Though his sainthood hasn’t been confirmed, he is considered by many the patron saint of alcoholics. The Unlikely Conversion of Mr. Talbot imagines Matt Talbot’s conversion as a lonely affair, a desperate prayer whispered over a toilet bowl. I imagine that the prayer captured in this poem is but one of many: a life cycle of regrets, false starts, and relapse. But isn’t that life, a series of failures and minor victories, whispered prayers, and broken promises?
Let me know what you think about the poem. Does Mr. Talbot find grace or is this but another bump in the road, a slow slide down the proverbial slope of letdown and regret?
THE UNLIKELY CONVERSION OF MR. TALBOT
He’s on his knees with his head
Bent over the bowl
Like a monk doubled over
In prayer. He convulses,
His muscles pulling at his
Bones, sending a shiver through
His system, his body
Turning inside out,
His rawhide insides
Blown bare, choking, heaving,
Gasping for air.
I wonder if God
Sees him hunched
Over his throne,
Tears running
Down the porcelain,
Groaning out a prayer.
Regretting the nights
He spent drowning in beer,
Wishing that he was anywhere,
Anywhere but here.