there’ll be ice-cream in the kingdom of god
the angels got thrown out
with their tuneless harps
singing in parts –
does god need such noise about?

there’ll be ice-cream in the kingdom of god
the angels ask to re-skill
“we’ll put down our halos
take up italiano
make rum ‘n’ raisin for the soul”

does god need all that praise and thanksgiving?
big-heads and dictators demand that…
ice-cream
a sign for the living
is where god’s kingdom is at.

– so in the ice-cream cafe
what dare I choose?
do I play safe with flavour?
what is there to loose
if I stretch my tongue tentatively around new knowledge?
if I let my taste buds off their noose?
if I celebrate the creative?
if I understand what I have understood
is not truth
but a jumped up lack of imagination
afraid of an ice-cream scoop?

but whilst in deliberation
I see a big smile on your face
unfreezing my moribund spiritual eye
it lets in light –
light I might have missed at Leighton Moss

so its god I see in your buggy
tasting that first ice-cream
joyfully plastered over the hair
blobbed-slobbed on the nose
slip-dripping down hands,
stuck to the face
the vanilla of life

there’ll be ice-cream in the kingdom of god
a real cosmopolitan place
no haughty holiness
no worthless worthiness
no faux friend-ness
no abundant life pretensions……

and then when you burst out laughing
the world starts laughing too
the passers by
have joy in their eyes
the kingdom has come
ice-cream has won
and for god that great ice-cream seller
dreams really do come true.