Asking For It
Richard Fein               
            

I'm dancing naked and waving a sign up to heaven saying in big red letters, 

"Call me, damn you. And if you're a cheap bastard you can reverse the charges."

You gave Cain a personal rebuke and tailor-made tattoo.

You gave Pharaoh boils, a dead son, and a Red Sea bath.

You shook Jericho's walls,

not to mention your pyromania in Sodom and Gomorrah,

along with your devilish habit of rubbing salt in the wounds.

But you, Great Smiter, have yet to aim one lightning bolt at me.

The world’s greatest bad guys earn your personal attention.

Am I not just as unworthy?

Isn't dancing naked holding a damn‑you‑bastard sign enough?

I want—No, I need your wrath.

Say something to me, something to me alone,

and not to some holy man to relay to me.

Playing telephone is a kid's party game,

and the last child in line hears only a daisy chain of garbled revelations.

Let me hear your real time voice, an actual live curse, but if not,

a "Come here boy" or "Heel," will do.