An Exorcism

We waited until he came home
and tied him to a chair.
We knew what had been going on,
and weren’t afraid to tell him so.
He said he didn’t know
what we were talking about
and I, I must confess, faltered
a moment on seeing him so scared,
our 16-year-old son. But we held firm
in faith and carried on, we knew
he wasn’t like the other boys,
and hadn’t been since 12 or thereabouts.
The moonlight came in slats
between the bars
of our cellar windows, high up and rectangular,
like heaven’s watchers keeping time.

I don’t care to say what exactly we did,
beyond read psalms and attack with incense.
I don’t care to say how exactly he seemed,
beyond by turns both scared and incensed.

But light came through at last
and we saved him for now.
The boy he dallied with remains a mystery,
the one who made the demon rise in him,

but we’ll investigate and see.