Small towns are great places to live, if you fit the “good Christian values”
mold. But as I’ve grown, and started to spill out of it, at least I have
my local church to support me. Wait. You shall not
give false testimony against your neighbor. Okay, in that case,
I hate the church.
No, I hate the people in the church. If that touched a nerve, feed me
to the wolves– no– feed me to the mob of worshippers, the same ones who
came for the angels Lot housed when he offered his daughters instead.
Preach the word to me, tell me He wants to welcome me to His
golden kingdom, but list all the things I’d have to change about myself
in order to make the cut. Please don’t forget to call me a Jezebel when I say
I simply don’t understand how my assaulter will make it to the
pearly gates before I will, how I am a whore who put myself
in a position to lose my value, but ensure me I am a martyr
who sacrificed my position in the afterlife for someone else
all in the same breath.
Hunt me down and burn me at the stake in the name of God because
you caught me kissing a girl, but never shine that light on the
dirty little secrets you house behind the altar– news flash:
your pastor is touching little boys.
And after you’re finished with me, go home to your whiskey (God says
you shouldn’t do that either, but never mind those verses) to take the
edge off, hold your Bible close to your chest– nevermind that the
spine is unbroken– and remind your poor repressed kids that God said:
let all you do be done in love. I wonder if my scorched skin stares
at those kids the way it stares at me in the holy water reflection. I hope
someday your small town ways will change, but I know that
the person will break before the mold ever does.
Abi Rhee