And Pigges Bones, Too

    

Here we have St Francis' tooth,

Extracted when He was a youth.

    How do you know?

It must be so—

Look at the label: "Behold the Truth."

Here is a taxidermied bird

Who peeped to every holy word.

    I disagree.

No faith, I see.

Under the dewy Dismas tree,

It stood, it chirped, it lent its song

To Good St Francis' fuzzy throng—

    God, what a crock!

—Until His holy waterclock

Said, Move this gig to Little Rock

And then to Pierre and Battle Creek.

And here's the mike with which He'd speak.

    Oh, I believe.

Now Saints be praised.

And here's some grass, on which they grazed,

On which whole multitudes were fed,

Church Live, Church Militant, Church Dead.

    Oh, that I were.

The proof is Love,

Which motivated stars above

To send the rain St Francis felt.

And here's a vial. The smells he smelt—

    Are bottled there.

If anywhere.

The world's a relic. All things melt

To one thing, Faith and Hope and Bees,

Kine and Kin, Foals and Fleas—

    and Fools.

Who would believe is none.

St Francis is not meat for schools:

He is the voice of everyone,

All shaved and sheared. Thus here—take these—

    I'd rather not.

    I'll be the man the Lord forgot—

His Greatest Hits on 2 CD's.