Manchegan Decalogue

[Note: This poem is incomplete at the moment. I was hoping to get some feedback on what I have so far. The full poem will have ten sections of four stanzas each.]

Manchegan Decalogue

Prelude:
When I walk the barren land
Looming hills of sun-burnt sand
Hide the traces of my work:
Wrath on sinners that I took.

I am the LORD of this land
Thy God with blood-stained hands
Eternally cleansed of my crimes
Striking down each Peter Grimes.

I.
The boy held his head up high
As he tended to the sheep
Crossing the windswept plateau toward
Andalucía: winter’s keep.

Francisco Franco and his LORD
Rid the land of Marxist sores
Like the Catholic kings of old
Who lay waste to all the Moors.

Autumnal winds brought in the cold
Already present in hearts half-starved
Parched of thirst for water and choice
For freedom is ever loved.

Those who suffered heard the voice
Like Moses in Sinai heard say
Thou shalt have no other gods
Before me, your cacique.

II.
Pausing to take a backward glance
Toward the white-washed windmills, spinning
Like giants across the rose-gold sky
The boy saw his god, grinning.

LORD formed Man with a heavy sigh
In His image the Church found sin
Bathed in the righteous blood of Man
Franco made Spain born again.

Around the hearth rural families stand
To warm their hands and relax their bones
Hear chilling tales from their padre
Of______________[unfinished line].

Over nearby hills there lay the façade
Of Man’s stone idol with copper oxide
The boy thought to himself how peculiar
It was that their LORD resides inside.

III.
As thoughts of god led back to his father
Every evening the nightmare returned
To haunt the boy and remind him of why
The Church was the evil his father had spurned.

Perhaps the clergy thought they were white lies
Intended to coerce the horde of believers
To follow a code of strict behavior
Based on pompous smoke and deceitful mirrors.

In stark contradiction to the words of their Savior
The faithful despised sinners, thinking they are higher
Than those freedom-loving rebels who never drank the wine
The Church led them in witch hunts and trials by fire.

The boy’s father took Franco’s name in vain one time
Questioning those who only believe in Revelation
As to why the Valley of the Fallen was solely made
To commemorate soldiers of Franco’s station.

IV.
The boy shuddered in his sleep
Recalling that dreaded Sunday
When his father was dragged to town
For the things he’d had to say.

The priest came out in his regal gown
To publicly condemn this one
“For blasphemy against Church and State
This shall be your last glimpse of sun.”

The gathering crowd was incited to hate
When the priest assured them of this man’s sin
And told them to enact God’s wrath
“Let the thunderous rain of stones begin!”

The boy cannot forget that Sabbath
It is seared into his memory
How his father’s fiery blood
Pooled in the streets of Gethsemane.