The Long Train of Suffering

Jesus was a beggar
who invested his income
He didn't make his fortune
in his father's
furniture shop
He kept the government
from taxing his capital gains
made on the goat market
by using an offshore account
It's the Christian thing to do

Won't everybody be surprised
when they have to take their turn
as Jesus in another life
Your reincarnation
only with a different body
is surrounded by the tools
of cruelty and crucifixion
Somewhere in that limbo
the cross
now forged titanium
will have been recycled
through the many lives
that have to go through
government sponsored torture

For that time
some disfavored race
will sit on the sidelines
with rating cards
ranging from zero point zero
to ten
How well did this Jesus suffer?
Six point seven
The audience applauds
Someone yells that
the judges needed to raise
the decision
Apostles are never satisfied
Those judges were Dyacks
from Borneo
who will now have to be
persecuted and wander for centuries
because they killed this Jesus
They didn't really
It just makes them the best
loincloth tailors and rag merchants
in the next history

The tomb is a refrigerated morgue
Some Mary will march
through the doors
with an entourage
in her furs and jewels
Including a blonde bimbo
they call The Mag
only to find the bin
empty
Now how did he open it
Oh yes it's magic
The auditorium is silent
when the announcer
taps the mic
It's “Jesus starring in
'Houdini on Ice'”

This Jesus runs around
showing everybody his holes
entrance wounds made with lasers
so he can be hung on the pegs
No more of those pointy spikes

See
this Jesus says
boy was that a trip

Jesus rises to heaven
since by this time
anti-gravity is as simple
as healing the sick
The Apostles split up
This show is over
The audience is restless
for the next Jesus
Next!?!

Okay kid
get some Apostles together
No you can't use the ones
the previous Jesus used
Their off writing their memoirs
starting churches
Some will be such a pain
in the ass
they'll be crucified
It's a tough world kid
but you can do it
Now start pitching
that stuff
being about
your father's business
Oh insurance
That'll make an interesting
chapter in a new testament

Risk assessment
how to avoid being
the next Jesus

I can tell you this kid
You're gonna wind up
on a cross
No two ways about it
There are benefits
This time you don't
have to drag it through
the streets
like the first Jesus
The whole thing
has been simplified
They just hang you
on the pegs
You die
save the world
and go to heaven
easy peasy


Barry G. Wick