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| Blessed light |
Today's psalm is the penultimate. I love that word. It sounds so important. As we've moved toward Easter this week, I've found that the Easter imagery has sort-of taken over. I worry about my poems becoming too Catholic sometimes, but the imagery from Catholicism is just so rich with suffering, hope, blood, and light. I can't resist it. When you grow up Catholic, it becomes part of your daily vocabulary. It soaks into your skin.
Tonight, I'm going to play the organ and sing at the Easter Vigil mass at my church. It's my favorite service of the year, full of ritual and candles and beauty. It starts after sundown and lasts for a little over two hours, usually. The moment that appeals to me the most is gathering in the dark sanctuary. After dusk, my church is pitch black on the inside. And then the Easter flame is lit, and the light is passed from candle-to-candle throughout the church. When I look down from the choir loft, the pews are swimming with fire and warmth. It's absolutely gorgeous.
Today's poem is about vigils people keep.
Saint Marty hopes you're having a peaceful and blessed weekend.
Psalm 46: Vigil
When my grandmother died, my dad
Sat by her bed all night, recited
Rosaries, listened as her breaths
Became lighter, lighter, the space
In between, longer and longer,
Like waves on a summer beach, soft
Swells and troughs breaking on sand.
Hiss. Silence. Hiss. Greater silence.
My dad kept vigil, waited for dawn,
The last wave, the greatest silence.
The night before my wife gave birth
To our daughter, the hospital room
Was filled with family, friends.
We took turns holding my wife’s hand
When the pain overcame her,
Preparing her body to deliver new life.
Outside, snow, wind tore through darkness
As we kept vigil, waited for sunrise.
This Holy Saturday, I will go to church
After night falls. In the black pews,
I will wait for the priest to light
The first fires of Easter, for the flame
To pass from candle to candle
Until the walls, pillars, ceiling
Of the sanctuary flood with light.
I will go with my daughter,
Keep vigil with her, wait
For the church to bloom
With bells and incense and hymns,
Psalms of deserts and seas,
Hunger and manna.
I will sing with her, loud,
Joyful songs, calling all the children
Out to the playground, under the stars,
To slide, to clap, to dance, to shout,
To swing so high their feet
Kick the last breath of night
To the first cry of morning.
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