Thinly Veiled, Young Man Comes to Me Seeking a Friendly Face (The Joker)

Jason Mott

from Story and Storytelling

So I’m out and about one day 

when this priest walks up to me and says,  

“Beloved bard, my mother has died  

and my father is ill and I’ve lost my faith.” 

And I said to him, “But faith’s forever! 

Got a lifetime warranty, doesn’t it? I’ve 

always wondered about that though, 

whose life?” 

But, anyhow, this “priest” said to me, 

“God’s become a ghost. An imagination 

in my head. He used to feel so real. 

I could touch him in my mother’s hands.” 

“But now he doesn’t take 

your calls, right? Right. Now 

‘This number is no longer in use.’ 

You’ve lost your signal, right?” 

The priest nodded. He nodded 

and I took his hands in mine 

and I told him, smiling as I spoke, 

“The crow flies at sunrise.” 

I told him, “Padre, I dreamed, once, 

of a world between my fingers, 

a world made from Muscadine grapes. 

A world drenched in methane perfume, 

oozing, like the minty stench 

of cookies, cut out and called lives— 

light and clockwork lives 

built from porridge instead of wood. 

In this dream, you were there, Padre, 

wearing a thousand sweet names, 

a million tender, soft voices—‘personae’ 

the academics might call them—and you looked so sad 

you could have been a lovesick sunrise, 

hiding yourself behind my name like you did. 

And, me being the laughing boy that I am, 

I let you wear my skin. And I grieved 

with you. I wept with you, Padre, in this one 

dream of mine. No matter what face you wore,  

I took your pain and I called it Ambrosia, 

and you and I split it in half, and it hurt a little less, 

and you and I ate together and we became gods. 

But still, because I loved you, I wept 

for you, living down there  

on that little, overripe, unmashed- 

grape of a world between my fingers. 

And you, you heard my weeping, 

and you smiled at my weeping,  

and you laughed at my weeping,  

and you wore a wonderful new grin that grew 

out of my tears—tears that used to be yours; 

and your laughter danced over my lips 

like the flapping, leather wings of flutter-bys. 

Through your wall of chuckles— 

through my wall of tears— 

I heard you calling me. You 

called to me and asked me 

for more laughter—less pain in life—you hunted 

for me the way Mars pined for Venus's flower. 

And, Padre, who am I, the Joker,  

to refuse a laugh? Could Venus refuse? 

Could Pandora say no 

to that little black box 

cooing gently in her lap 

like a six-faced angel? 

And what about Moses? Could he 

not lead these folks from bondage? 

(They asked him for it ya know.) 

But didn’t he come down from the mountain 

full of good humor, colored hair, and poetry? 

And, while we’re on the subject, where’s  

your golden calf, Padre? Still hung 

from your sad, pathetic neck I see. 

But, then again, what’s a golden calf 

between friends? Really? Those 

Israelites, it all turned out okay for them 

in the end, didn’t it?"

Of course it did. So buck up. 

Walk it off, or ‘walk it out’ as the kids say 

these days. No more tears for that dead mother, 

okay? She’ll still be dead tomorrow. 

And as for the ill father, don’t fret there either. 

He’s just finally been let in on the great secret 

of life—all jokes must end. And as for God, 

that imaginary voice in your head, cut it out—

I’ll offer the knife—or take up poetry. 

Then you can wear your masks and hide your hurt 

behind me and I’ll laugh with you, and I’ll cry 

with you, and I’ll tie a tourniquet on your heart.”  

Image © Daniel McCullough

---

Jason Mott was recently selected as a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow. He is the bestselling author of five novels: The Wonder of All Things, The Crossing, The Returned (adapted for ABC television as Resurrection), and Hell of a Book, which was a New York Times bestseller, a TIME Magazine “100 Must-Read Books,” and the winner of the 2021 National Book Award for Fiction, and People Like Us.  

Jason has also published two poetry collections, We Call This Thing Between Us Love and “...hide behind me…”. He holds a BFA in Fiction and an MFA in Poetry, both from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, where he also serves as an associate professor in the Creative Writing program. He lives in southeastern North Carolina. 

jasonmottauthor.com