Jesus
keeps knocking on the door
of the bathroom stall
at the McDonald’s off I-95
just past the North Carolina state line.

I’ll be out in just a miiiii-nuuuute
I sing and Jesus says
I want to come in and I say
I’m busy just now Jesus
wait your turn but Jesus keeps
knock knock knocking
and then he just
materializes
inside the stall and he says
let me in and I’m like
uhh looks like you’re in dude
and he’s like no
I mean let me into your heart
and I say dude, I’m peeing here
avert your eyes and he goes
I knew thee in thy mother’s womb
and I’m like yeah
I was a baby
I wasn’t so particular then
and he’s still going
let me in let me in so I go
not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin
and he’s all what? So I say

The Three Little Pigs dude
that is my contribution
to the nursery rhyme portion
of this conversation
and he says I don’t know about all that
I go mom said you know everything
he says no that’s my dad
and by now I’m pretty tired of his shit
so I say Jesus, Jesus
you’re worse than my kids
at least they’ll give me
five minutes of peace
when I’m on the damn toilet
and he’s all I am the prince of peace
and I’m like ok,
buddy. So,

I gotta actually invite you in, right?
he goes yeah
I go you know,
it’s the same with vampires
and he goes huh? and I say yeah man,
if you don’t specifically ask them in
they can’t come in
and he just looks at me so I go
are you really a vampire, man?
Is that why I gotta ask you in?
and then I think about it
and holy shit
it’s right in the fucking story
YOU ROSE FROM THE DEAD
and he says shit.
Daddammit.
and then he disappears.

So I think I dodged a bullet here, guys.

Jennifer Maloney writes in Rochester, NY. She is the current President of Just Poets, Inc., a literary organization based in that city. Find her work in Aaduna.org, The Pangolin Review, Memoryhouse Magazine, and the forthcoming edition of the blog Celebrating Change, available online 7/12/19. Jennifer founded Just Poets Presents! a reading series dedicated to listening to, and paying, under-heard and marginalized poets.