March 23, 2018At the Annual Worley Family Reunion
Well, we don’t need name badges.
A good turnout this year, I think,
though it’s awkward, like wearing
someone else’s shoes that almost fit.
Jeff Worley the heavy-metal guitarist
is easy to spot—pink hoop earrings,
face a porcupine of pins gleaming like mica
under the too-bright lights. I sidle over to him.
I play guitar too, I say. Peter, Paul & Mary?
That kind of thing? He suddenly has
somewhere else to be. Because Pastor Jeff
of the Jeff Worley Ministries in Lynchburg,
VA, has a “God-given burden” (his website)
to reach lost souls, he locks in on me.
Shakes my hand, smiles, and gives me
an Old Testament. Then Jeff Worley
the transvestite (if I don’t miss my guess)
cruises up in his slick, tight limousine
of leather pants and wants to know who
he has to fuck around here to get a drink.
Pastor Jeff and I point, in sync, to the bartender
tucked in the corner. Which is where
I go too, because truly I’m a little
weirded out by all these other JWs
and need a calm drink or two with myself—
the wives and girlfriends down the block
surely mocking us in Margarita Heaven—
before the Talent Show. Tonight:
Cleaver Juggling, Clogging in Ice Skates,
Crawling in Place, and the Sneezing Competition.
But first some music. The band—
heavy-metal Jeff is sitting in—plays
“We Are the Champions” (we are?).
Then, with the same awkwardness
I take with me wherever I go, like carrying
mismatched luggage, I join in the dance
under the many-faceted disco ball—
a swirling, staggering, phantasmagoric whirligig.
from #58 - Winter 2017