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Once

It's April and it should be warmer,
A day like the belly of a whale,
So I'm burning religious books
In my wood stove.
I read a few lines,
Then in the book goes
To the red jaws of the devil.

What an odd concept prayer,
Within our incompetence we beg
Another force to intervene
To grant us what we can not
supply ourselves.
And why does a single god
Appeal more than multiples?
First we needed so many gods,
But now it's just one
Or none.

But they burn fairly good, the books;
I scan a few mildewed pages
before the toss to flame.
Methodists are ahead in the count,
Baptists and Catholics even up,
Jews trail.