Cemetery Of The Called.

Three months was plenty
to smell the mildew of old robes
and the perfume of ambition
that sticks to every hymnal.

They told me it was formation
but the concrete was already cracked.
The professors fed on trauma politely,
like ravens in clerical collars.

Piety became performance art,
with applause for the most exhausted.
The angels of light checked attendance
while demons filed the paperwork.

I left before the sinkholes swallowed me,
before my gifts learned to play dead,
before I joined the clergy choir
of those who failed at everything else
but sermons.