Black Jesus
Brandon Cook
The first time I encountered Black Jesus was above the Mass Avenue Baptist Church soup kitchen
I was sent to do some errand and passed through the sanctuary, where I met him on a huge canvas, above the pulpit, baptizing souls lost and found, his dark skin so different from the white Jesuses I grew up with
Of course, Jesus was a Jew, and I realized we all want a Jesus to look like me and less like you
But Black Jesus met me in some other part of my soul, where I had been long in waiting, as in a room, tapping my feet, knowing there was someone yet to meet
His eyes, piercing, invited me
And I sat in the cavernous sanctuary for an hour that winter afternoon
On long blue pews worn down by so many souls sighing in the longing to find something beyond a vague
sense of love:
A scent specific as fire
A look as knowing as a lovers' desire
Something we’d not only live but die for
Love, always specific, in flesh and bone, is why I believe, after all:
Love cannot be other than eyes and skin
Not an idea but a hand, to open a door and let you in, and say your name
A mouth, too, denying difference, saying “All is the same”
But revealing, too, that all is resolutely different
To humble you, to help you fall
Which is the only way you gain your sight
And just enough light
To see anything at all