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Have you ever found yourself stranded in the tract
between what you think is fiction and what you think is fact?
And whipped so hard with the bible belt, your minds a welt of doubt
throbbing in confusion as you try to sort things out?
Do you ever look for answers that you hope to find
will quell the inquisitions raging in your mind?
I once made confirmation in a little church somewhere
down around salvation row as the preacher there
led the congregation in Armageddon prayer.

He stood upon the altar and clutched a sacred script
that he held so reverently in his fervent grip.
And with celestial sanctity dilating in his eyes
he opened to the book of holy genocide.
It was revelations where he fingered out a verse
for his heaven chambered thoughts targeted to earth.
Then in a heated passion a searing sermon flared
with words of burning prophecy flaming through the air,
he led the congregation in Armageddon prayer.

Posted in the steeple was a sentry priest
who was scanning the horizon far off to the east
for the second coming of his commander in chief.
Baptized into prophecy he was dripping with belief
there must be devastating war, misery and grief.
Then saluting with his crucifix, held as if a sword,
he vowed to carry out the dictates of his lord:
to crusade off to martyrdom and be canonized somewhere
with the congregation in Armageddon prayer

Rigid in demeanor, with a stopwatch in his lap,
teeth clenched in resentment till enamel cracked,
sat a now obscure preacher who once predicted that
the world was soon to end in a fission thunderclap.
But his career imploded when the ticking tocked
past the point of expiration set on his atomic clock.
Now fused to disappointment he radiated glares
at the preacher in the pulpit, who orchestrating there,
led the congregation in Armageddon prayer.

Wearing silver spurs and a frock with riding whip
a deacon understudy was biting thru his lip
serving out the term of his apprenticeship.
He dreams one day of riding, bible slung onto his hip,
with the hallowed horsemen of the Apocalypse.
He plans to round up all the strays, corral them in a herd,
then brand each and everyone with the sacred words
that he’ll burn into their consciousness with exacting care
as he leads the congregation in Armageddon prayer

Now, I swear there is a paradise right in your backyard,
slightly out of ear shot of the word of God.
You will hear the laughter that little lungs bellow
just from the way the grass feels between their tiny toes.
It’s a place where they can play catch the butterfly
and look for shooting stars to streak across their eyes.
It’s the world of innocence, mostly children living there,
in extroverted wonderment completely unaware
the faithful have included them in Armageddon prayer.

To what level of insanity is it, some men will attest, 
to think that their lives are somehow to be blessed
as promises of war, famine, pestilence and death
come leaping from the pages of some ancient text
to descend down upon him as he humbly genuflects?
To what level of belief, is it, that a faith expects
for a man to summon, with his salvation breath,
some prophetic beast belching havoc and despair
to join the congregation in Armageddon prayer?
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