Three Saints

Three saints glimmer in the morning light,
staid and solid and likely wondering how it is
that their broken lives carried on for generations,
until they became almost idols,
gilded and comic book perfect,
not at all the real struggling souls
their family and friends knew so well.

If they were visiting, you wonder,
would they recognize themselves and what they have become?
Would they be puzzled, or angry that in their preservation,
their humanity was lost?
Would the clear the temple like Jesus at the Passover?
Or would they smirk, happy to be remembered
as men far better than they felt they were,
dancing their way to heaven like a guilty child?

About this poem

All the saints I know today are flawed, wonderful people, who pooh-pooh the idea that they are anything special.

But they are. Oh yes, they are.

Tom