Featured Poetry

Common Things in an Uncommon Way

Daniel McCullough

As a child, I hated it: the feel of news

ink, jet text imprinting my palms,

my fingertips with the urgency

 

of the past twelve hours. Of course

I ended up running a newspaper.

So much smoking in the office 

 

that windows seemed coated 

with yellowed cellophane.

So many people passing through

 

to buy ads or input stories on screens

as small as my hands. Amanda

with her straight hair always falling

 

onto a paste board. Vanessa working

extra hours to save for her marriage. 

Josh preparing an editorial. Robbie 

 

listening to new albums to review. 

Patrick, trying to experience what he could 

before entering the seminary. He disapproved 

 

of all the smoking, so he became Father Pat.

A joke. We all believed he’d never take vows. 

Decades later, finally free from ink, I read

 

a random headline online: US priest’s 

sentence offer for molesting child 

too lenient, says accuser in case.

 

Of course it was Father Pat. He took vows.

Of course it was The Guardian

with its name heralding protection.

 

He taught at St. Benilde, named 

after the saint who “did common things 

in an uncommon way.” Pope Pius said that. 

 

“No day is ever the same,” said Father Pat in 

the Clarion Herald, our hometown Catholic newspaper.

“I love preaching,” he also said, “but I like 

 

hearing confessions even better.” 

So many times, I ended up rubbing

my ink-stained hands against my shirt

 

or on my khaki-covered thighs. A record

of what had come loose from the page.

Did Father Pat enjoy the confessions

 

he made, after listening to the venal sins

of children? Or did he confess at all?

Did he keep everything to himself,

 

cleaning his hands against his black shirt.

knowing his stains wouldn’t be seen?

Did I take moments to look past

 

his discussions of baseball statistics

and disapproving glances at Amanda

because he knew she always used vulgar 

 

language to mock him as a priest to be?

If I had seen the damage he was to create,

what would I have done, then? 

 

Every staircase is safe until I miss a step, 

twisting my left ankle. The pain is hardly 

noticeable, except when rain falls.  

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