Back to poems! And stay tuned for a special announcement at the end of this post.

This poem was published August 25, 2022 in Earth & Altar Magazine.

Elaine Elizabeth Belz
AND THE WORD BECAME FLESH

O, Bread my tongue
has taken and my teeth
have crushed: leave your imprint
deep in my molars, deeper
than the fillings in them, deeper
than the aching of referred pain
locking up my jaw.

Dissolve into my tastebuds and dissolve
my tastes for everything but you.
Come, Bread so crucial: condescend
to fill this glutton’s belly.
Seek out every corner where hunger
spurns all store-bought food.

Living Bread the heavens can’t contain,
mingling with the masses of microbiota
deep in my gut: Lest I move
to dismiss you,

Take me. Absorb me.
Meld with every molecule in me.
Burst into each cell where I
labor stupidly to express my own
mangled DNA. Come, Bread of heaven
and rewrite that code.

Consume me, all of me:
the excess fat, the scars
the diseased brain
where serotonin-starved emptiness

howls. Come, Bread of Life, and find me
where I duck and dodge firing neurons,
here in the mock infinity
of my yawning synapses.

I want to be whole.
Incorporate me into your Body, broken
into one.

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This poem took about a decade from start to finish, but only because I kept putting it away and coming back to it, as I was nervous about hitting the blue notes well.

It started as a flood of thoughts following a service of Holy Eucharist at the cathedral I worked at as a verger, while I was moving furniture as part of my job. Eventually I was able to jot down some notes on paper on my way to lunch. That’s actually part of my process, though. If I write down my first thoughts too quickly, it never seems to go anywhere; but if I’m spinning a couple of phrases around in my head for a while, that’s much more fruitful. (Personally, I love hearing people’s creative processes, so I’d be glad to hear yours, dear reader!)

I don’t subscribe to the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation—I believe in Jesus’ Real Presence in the Eucharist, but don’t pretend to know how it works, or even what exactly it means (“Thou art here; we ask not how.”) But this poem does take that Presence seriously. Whether you read it as transubstantiation or not, it’s a meditation on receiving Christ in the Sacrament, physically, into your—well, my, if I’m honest—body. “My flesh is food indeed…”

(And yes, that is how I mean that one part. If we take the Incarnation seriously, then all of our bodies, and all of their functions, are sanctified.)

I was encouraged to pick this one up again when “Habitus” was well-received. You can see more of the same toothache here in this poem, too. Now that tooth is broken, as is another, so Jesus can get right down in there if he likes. I mean, I’m hiding in his wounds; can he not pay mine a visit?

For publication, I agreed to change one word, although I think I like my original choice more. It certainly wasn’t a hill to die on, but I think it does change the meaning a bit. Instead of “spurns” (“…where hunger / spurns all store-bought food.”) I originally had “eludes.” I liked the image of hunger intentionally dodging the very thing it needs. Maybe it knows it will cease to exist if satisfied? If instead it’s “spurning” store-bought food, maybe that’s because the food is store-bought and not the Bread from heaven. My own hunger’s not that spiritually advanced yet. But I am very good at running away from what I need.

The week between when my poetry group (the “Detroit Poetry Salon,” we’re now officially calling ourselves) agreed I should send it out and when I sent it out, there was a study reported in the news questioning the role of serotonin in depression. I worried about that for a bit, but I was encouraged not to overthink it. I have not since checked back to see how that study has fared; maybe I’m too busy, or maybe I don’t want to overthink it. (I do take an SSRI along with a mood stabilizer for my bipolar depression—being type 2, I tend more toward depression.)

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Speaking of the Detroit Poetry Salon…

One week, a couple of poets brought poems that mentioned squirrels, and we started joking that we all would be bringing a squirrel poem the next time (we meet roughly every two weeks). Well, some did…and eventually, most of us wrote at least one. And now we’re going to give a live, in-person reading of all these squirrel poems! They vary quite a bit in subject matter, style, and tone. We’ll be at the Lawrence Street Gallery on Woodward in Ferndale (see the flyer below) on Sunday, November 19. Their current art exhibit is, “Animalia—the Others Among Us.” Even if you don’t live in the area, check out their website to see (purchase, even) the artwork!

And, yes, I have a squirrel poem.