Elul 3: Welcome to Heaven by Rick Lupert

Welcome to Heaven! / Did I really make it here? I didn’t think I was all that great. / Oh, you were fine. / Really? What about all those times in my car when I yelled at other drivers with language that would cause plants to die? / Everyone’s a maniac in their car. If we denied entry to everyone who had road rage, this place would be a ghost town. / It sort of is a ghost town when you think about it. / Haha yeah, you’re right! That’s hilarious! You’re funny…you should sign up for the open mic. / You have open mics. up here? / Yeah… every Tuesday…they’re pretty good too…music, comedy, poetry…and no-one reads those dark existential angsty poems as, well, the afterlife has been revealed and all. / Oh, sounds cool, yeah, those were the worst. Wait a minute…I’m Jewish; I thought we were waiting for the world to come…do we even believe in the Pearly Gates? / Well, not really. But since there is actually no “correct” religion, the Buddhists built these as kind of a gag. / The Buddhists built it?!? / Yeah, and God and Vishnu released a joint-Tweet proclaiming their awesomeness. They’ve got a heck of a sense of humor. / God and Vishnu…wait a minute…you have Twitter up here? / Yeah, but it’s not connected to the one in life…actually, there was a whole copyright thing. But then we realized the folks at Earth Twitter couldn’t prove that we existed so it blew over. By the way, you get an organic fruit basket delivery on Sunday mornings and everyone gets a Prius. / A Prius? Do I need to drive up here? Aren’t you worried about road-rage? / Nah, we don’t have any roads. / Well, why do I need the car then…ahh, never mind…So I guess I should just go on in? / Yup, head on in. Take a left at the statue of the Easter Bunny (Jesus put that up…HILARIOUS!) and you’ll get to the welcome center. / Okay…thanks for everything…I’m heading in. Oh cool; everyone’s naked!


Rick Lupert is the author of 15 poetry books and editor of A Poet’s Haggadah. He works as a songleader and graphic designer. www.poetrysuperhighway.com