As Thomas, Doubting
       

I was not his twin. I tried to listen: be tenantless,
he said, Mary was male like us and could enter
the kingdom. Mary: tanned and touched
too thoroughly. He kissed her on the mouth.
To me, he said, you think too much. See what is
in front of you. But when I looked there
was nothing. Not nothing: thorn and thicket. Thomas,
he said, his thumb against my temple, you know
the difference between tender and tenderness.
It is not enough to be in thrall. Be a passerby.

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Copyright © 2016 JK Daniels All rights reserved
from New Orleans Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission