Spirit – a poem by Christina E. Petrides

Spirit

A bar can be a good place to pray.
Nobody minds you mumbling into your cocktail.
It’s too loud for private chats to be overheard.
You can cry to Christ about the state of the world,
rail against its war-torn edges,
contemplate eternity across the salted rim, 
through the double barrel of the opaque stir straw,
and other patrons and the staff will simply think 
your soulfulness comes from excess spirits.
You can sip and simmer secretly in mindful love,
consider the incarcerated and the displaced,
scroll through oppression and messages,
plan how to spend your small social capital fighting evil,
fumble rhymes (so many hymns set to drinking tunes!),
and ask the Almighty for the otherwise impossible.
Be still in the chaotic dark, assured of aqua vit
gratis, inexhaustible.

American Christina E. Petrides started writing poetry on Jeju Island, South Korea, where she lived for 6.5 years. Her verse collection is On Unfirm Terrain (Kelsay Books, 2022). Her children’s books are Blueberry Man (2020), The Refrigerator Ghost (2022), Tea Cakes, Quilts, and Sonshine (2022), and Mr. Fisher’s Whiskers (2024). She is the primary translator of Maria Shelyakhovskaya’s memoir, Being Grounded in Love (2023). Her website is: http://www.christinaepetrides.com. Substack: christinaepetrides.substack.com