"What's this?" Jesus asked his disciples.
He held up a rectangular slip of paper.

"Looks like a light-rail pass,"
said Peter.

Jesus flipped it over:
one the back, in large letters,
he'd written the word HEAVEN.
"What's this?" he asked. 

"Oh, oh, I know!" said John,
eagerly raising and waving his hand.

"Yes?"

"Now it's a one-way ticket to heaven!"
John, grinning, looked around at the other disciples.

Nodding, Jesus slowly tore the pass in two,
then stacked the two halves
and tore them in two again.
He opened his hand,
and the dry, Denver wind,
piece by piece,
picked the ruined pass from his hand
and scattered it down the street.

"This isn't why I'm here," he said.

"Then why are you here? asked Lydia,
who at the moment was knitting another cap
to give to someone homeless at the park.

"For exactly that," Jesus said,
indicating the skeins of color
steadily transforming
between the clicking needles
held by Lydia's graceful, dancing fingers.
"To make sure everyone wears such crowns–
crowns we create."

Judas (I?) meanwhile
ran up the sidewalk,
robes flapping like crow's wings,
grabbing at the fragments of the ticket,
frantic and alone.

Text and image © 2012 by Dirk deVries. All rights reserved.