The Face on Mars

 a sermon

 Friends, it is good to see you here today,
 good to have had this time with you to pray.
 Please, please. Be seated. What I have to say,

 though new to everybody here, will not,
 I think, shock you, for everything I've taught,
 the whole evolving system of my thought,

 has led me (it is clear in retrospect)
 to this: a truth the whole world will reject –
 except for you, my dear ones, my elect.

 You will recall, from past sermons I've given
 on different members of the host of heaven,
 that Mars is the most crucial – more so even

 than Jupiter. I wonder have you read
 any of what has recently been said
 about Mars having been inhabited?

 Some of these people are lunatics, I know.
...