Athena Dixon

Calling Jesus

We were saved in a skating rink phone booth.

The Starlite's neon glory slipping away

between the pages of a pocket bible.

Lisa and I cut eyes toward the wooden circle

blurred by the momentum of young bodies.

The kaleidoscope whizzed by on wheels faster

until our eyes snapped back into place.

A woman prayed over us, her spittle settling

among the freckles on Lisa's face. She

was crammed beside me in the booth,

the handset pressed into the knobby bones

of her spine. The woman's watery eyes darted

across our faces while she mouthed the scripture

to save our souls. She waited for her Father

to appear. We waited for His kingdom to crack

open above the DJ booth and rain salvation

over us children here only to skate, not rebuke

the devil. We claimed sins when she tapped

a finger against our chests. Promised to give

our souls to Jesus, anything to be away from

her tilted crusade.

Will you accept him?

Do you hear him knocking?

Let him in.

Athena Dixon earned an MFA from Queens University of Charlotte. Her

poetry has appeared in The Penguin Review, Pluck!: The Journal of

Affrilachian Arts and Culture and The Amistad. She is currently an

English adjunct living in Southern New Jersey.