The Poetry Bus goes to Meetin’

Argent is driving the bus this week. She has asked for a poem about a meeting. The ones at work are so deadly that I went back further to an entirely different type of meeting.

I suppose camp meeting means different things to different people. My church didn't have the tradition, but when my cousin KJ was a youth minister she took me to the one her church participated in. I was in college at the time and I was fascinated. Staying in little shacks for a week (which were coveted – if you were a family with a shack you were gold). Going to revival meetings. Hearing the bellowing that meant there was a good revival preacher – just in the background as you walk around and around the circle, cruising without cars. As far as I know, my mother never attended one, so the poem below is a work of fiction.

Camp Meeting

Cammeetin' is
an elaborate
courtship ritual.
Chasing and being
chaste under the
watchful village eye -
avoiding the glory tent
where my mother
is being washed
in the blood
of the lamb
one more time.

Pictures from here. Definitely check out the website if you're interested in learning more! And go visit Argent to read other what the other Bus commuters have to say.