The Catechist Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

When we spun ourselves
On classroom benches
As low-bowing, earth-licking
Scrubbed
And rinsed catechumens
At a small village,

Our catechist, attired
In his smirk
Stretching his temple
Like a strip
Of flattened balloon
Yielding to its elastic edges,

Enlarged the tentacles
Of his choked smile
Crawling down his cheeks
To a softly rolling moth,

To strop his arrows
Of questions to hurl at us.

He pointed his gun
Of sharp inquiry
To shoot at us
The bullet of what was

The fastest trajectory
Or route to cruise
To the beaming
Rolling firmament
Of quiet smooth flows,

No barrage erected
To throw back
Sprinting waters

Swelling us into
An upstream whirlpool
That could have sunk us
To the silt
Of a riverbed,

Soiling our answers
To stick to a clayey glue.

(ii)

Many said church,
The only hearth
To warm us up to God.

Others said climb a tall
Eucalyptus tree
To fly us
To the highest floor
Of air's boundless tower.

Others fired back:
Dive into a hole,
Our knees on its floor,

But he only chuckled
Like a clucking hen
And melted
Into a firmament's silence
Before ejecting
"Just up there, everywhere".