Attending
Mass with My First Love
We were standing
You and I,
In mass, snakes of smoke
From the chalice sliding
Grey down the aisle
And outward left and right
Over our semi-bowed heads,
The clank of the alter boy's
Swinging meeting the deep
Bang of the bells outside;
And I felt your fingers
Brush against mine
And I felt you everywhere
Even where the smoke couldn't
Reach,
And the silhouette of
Your inheritance showed
Outward past your chest,
Past our parallel
Union, and I shook at
Them from inside,
My mouth almost open.
But when I looked up
For your face I saw
A garden of dried onion
Faces, half peeled,
Skin hanging thin from
A shiny thickness that
Burns the eyes when breached,
But each was too brown
And dry to give juice,
And the roots stuck
Loosely in the cracked dirt
With no water.
And I saw a sun behind us all
Graying and burning out,
And then you reached over there
Behind the secrecy and protection
Of the pew
And rested your palm over me,
And the onions ripened and cracked,
Spraying a burning stickiness,
And my lids formed shields
Over my gateways as
The sting began, so
That all was blurry,
Even the hanging of
Our egos on the four
Directions behind the conductor.
And I was drawn fingers first
Toward the wall to the left,
My palm open and rubbing
Gently against the stone that
Held the mix of our shadows in
One two-dimensional collage
Of black, that moved as one
When we kneeled together in our secret.
Copyright © 2003 Dave Hopkins