Thank you to Mark Antony Rossi of Ariel Chart for publishing my poem.

https://www.arielchart.com/2022/01/the-priest-king.html

The Priest King

  

The awaiting hopefuls gather, 

their hastiest converging necessary.

They speak in hushed and conciliatory tones.

 

Newly selected,

this trusty replacement,

will be born of white smoke,

will choose a protective moniker,

make promises for a sure shirking from sin.

 

Censers sway to honor this most recent 

broker of treaties, and keeper of the faithful.

The gray at his temples on the side of his head

reminds him he must keep the edifice temple clean.

 

The faithless say that much written 

within past communiques will become obsolete.

The faithless say one hand cannot save all,

but the priest king reminds us

that civility buys hope,

and, for centuries, there has been one 

who can do the saving.