One Pound Daffodils

I’m sorry, I’m atheist,

I say to the man who stands on the corner

Babbling about baptism at me, leaflet in outstretched hand,

Weaponising words filled with hope and hate.

His faith is daggers on sharpened tongues.

I place my faith in the daffodils I carry home with me:

Tiny pockets of sunshine, those blooming beams of light.

I hold hope in the woman on Chute Street

Who smiles when I tell her I like the murals on her house,

Colours stretched across brick like my own wall of worship.

I find salvation in what she tells me:

Her friend likes art so she lets him practice what he preaches in paintbrushes,

Turning brick red into rainbow -

My very own water into wine.

I find communion in community,

In the kind faces who smile at me on the street,

In the girls I meet in club bathrooms who insist on making sure everyone is having fun.

My belief begins with the laughter I wake up to

When my friends share giggles downstairs:

A congregation held over iced coffees,

Hymns of them humming as they make breakfast or brush teeth,

Though Cate really cannot hold a tune.

My pilgrimage starts with a trainline ticket

To Bristol or Southampton or home.

It’s spiritual reassurance when Abi says she’d walk all the way to me if she had to.

There is no sin outside of unkindness.

My Bible sits in scrapbooks and the literature on my shelves.

I can see the cathedral from my window

But my own stained glass is the photos that litter my wardrobe,

Reminders of how loved I am and how much I love.

Sunshine is my scripture and who I know is all things holy.

I do not need your leaflet to provide me with comfort

Or some kind of moral code.

My resurrection reigns in the morning sunrise,

In knocking on doors for morning debriefs,

Mascara stains on tired under eyes - 

Atonement for the night before.

I believe in making a beautiful life for myself,

I believe in the good things that are coming,

And I don’t need spiritual guidance to know that.

Amen.