a new God

Reaching for my Chapstick, I was touched by an angel today.

Some scoff. They call it evil.

I don't know why I felt compelled so long ago. It wasn't like me.

To steal.

It was there, stuck in a plant, but not the one that had my name on it. I moved it. I took it out of the dirt of one and into the dirt of mine. There was just something about that figurine.

This was before the god that I served had died.

I remembered my grandfather. His funeral. We were so alike. Imaginative. The "odd" ones.

Always drawn to this man of whose heritage was mine. I was drawn to his secrets. His demons.

As a little girl I prayed, I begged for god to, "save him from his sins". I talked to him of hell and tried to scare and convince him to just say those magic words.

He died four years ago. It was then, at his funeral, as I watched my grandmother stand strong for hours while others gave their condolences, that I stole a plastic angel.

It lives in a pocket within my purse. Always with me. Why? Why do I keep it close? Why transfer it with each switch of a bag? I'm not sure.

One person said, "Heather that is a superstition and it's evil."

I just nodded. They want an answer.

Maybe it's because someone knew that there would be days when everything would feel chapped:

My Faith

My Relationships

My Hope

My Heart

And when I reach for salve, instead, an angel is grasped between my fingers.

I'm reminded of a new God

who so desperately wants me to move from what I thought I knew that day as I watched a body get lowered into the ground--to move from rules--and to steal an angel.

I wonder.. is that when it started?

(Written as Imperfect Prose and God Bumps).