by Stephen Cushman
(Caravaggio, Incredulità di san Tommaso)
Dactylon hōthe, digitum huc,
hither thy finger to feast in the gash
of unbroken black, poke the fat shadows
shafted with light in clear-dark baroque
it never quite is, no matter how badly
the sun has betrayed us, how faithless it’s been
with hemispheres elsewhere, don’t be so faithless,
put it right here, your pointer exactly
on where he gets off, suggestive Caravaggio
getting off somehow on slipping an index
into that slit, apocryphal, unbiblical,
what does it day, it says confession
but not penetration, in his whole oeuvre
no lady nude, what incredulity, hither the finger
adoring withholds from skeptical diddling,
what is believing but light enough to see
obscurity clearly, what better saint
for our shortest day, Wednesday this year,
over the hump.