THE LAST POPE

by Bill Costley


Disgraced
beyond endurance,
The Last Pope
writes his resignation
in invisible ink
on virgin vellum,
so that as he writes it,
nothing appears.

He smiles at the efficiency
of The Holy Spirit that
reads all, erases all.

Ritually, he drops the sheet
into a flaming brazier.
These illegible words
appear & disappear:Consummatum est.


Bill Costley serves on the Steering Committee of the San Francisco Bay area chapter of the National Writers Union.
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