Elliot Valentine Lee, Mel Hornyak - Litany of the Martyrs

QUINCY
Oh, Saint Sebastian
Painted half-naked, eyes turned to the sky
Shot to death by pagan arrows
But in your death you couldn’t die

SAINTS
Patron saint of athletes and archers

QUINCY
How does it feel to love your killers
Spilling your blood on the roman mud?
How does it feel to know you are chosen
Feeling the bite of your god’s harsh love?
They say if your hand won’t heed your commands
It’s best to cut it clean
They say if your eye is where wickedness lies
Better half-blind than obscene
But what if the core of you is the problem?
Thе vessel corrupted, mеtastasized sin
How to destroy the root of your evil
When evil is rooted within?

QUINCY
Hear me, Saint Francis
Patron saint of birds and decay
You burned in the briars your earthly desires
Earned your stigmata as you bent to pray

SAINTS
Hands and feet in holy agony

QUINCY
How did it feel to know you’re forgiven
The blood of the passion staining your nails?
How did it feel to prove your devotion
Touch, doubting thomas, as you were impaled?

QUINCY
They say
QUINCY/SAINTS
If your hand is what causes your sin
Kill it or all of you dies
QUINCY
They say
QUINCY/SAINTS
If your eye is what causes your sin
Pluck it before your demise
QUINCY
But what if you are the hand and the eye
Your shame is the vessel, you drown in your guilt
Awake for the surgery, reach for the scalpel
Excise the excuses you’ve built
QUINCY
St Lawrence, give me strength to never shrink from fiery blows!
St Lucy, take my hand, keep my arm steady as it goes!
St Cassian, help me smile and ask for more pain than I’ve earned!
QUINCY/SAINTS
St Jude, saint of hopeless causes…
QUINCY
I hope your causes burn!

SAINTS
(wrapping bandages around Quincy’s hands)
Quod si oculus tuus dexter scandalizat
Te erue eum et proice abs te expedit
Et si dextera manus tua scandalizat
Te abscide eam et proice abs te expedit

QUINCY

Hear me…

Hear me!

Burn!


QUINCY
When sin is deep inside the soul
To hurt it I must hurt the whole-
No more romans light the fire
So I’ll have to make my pyre
Earn my peace through wax and salt
Burn away the wrong and fault
Sink my shame into my skin
Begin again, begin again, begin again
Hear me, saints, in all your forms
QUINCY/SAINTS
Don’t judge my ways too well
QUINCY
I don’t believe in heaven
QUINCY/SAINTS
But I do believe in hell!
QUINCY
If the lord won’t let me die for something
I can live to prove I’m worthy
Make his sacrifice my own
I know how you felt, now, your pain was a penance
A prayer’s a deception unless it’s a groan