Stained Glass
in a catholic church
on a sunday when
her parents came
in separate cars to pray
she flitted about
and danced despite
a reprimanding stare
from aisle to aisle
and wandered back and forth
seen and unseen
in the gulf between them
until they from their separate rows
genuflected and drove away
mother in the family van
daddy in the station car
each thinking she
was with the other
and she at last
being a thing so small
knowing she was left alone
inside the granite walls
her bunny underneath her arm
its ears curled down
the last mass of the day complete
and all the lights inside put out
with nothing left to save the dark
except the blinking candle lamps
and the blue light spilling from the sky
through the arcs of colored window glass
the brown-skinned priest
whose sermon she could hardly hear
or understand the words
had closed the alabaster door
of the tabernacle
and locked the sanctuary’s door
with a silver key
tucked beneath his waist
and retired to who knows where
and gazing from behind the nearest pew
at candles side by side in cups of red and blue
with intermittent wicks of fire
she wonders for a moment what to do
then looks again from here to there
and back again
and seeing no one there
she sucks her thumb
and hugs her bunny tight
and does not speak or dare
a tear or smile
but holds the cares
that come from being small
and left alone at such an age
in the same way she holds
the aging rabbit at her breast
and speaks in whispers tender words
that hang about the air
like echoes of the echoes of an angel’s prayer
her hair a halo in the falling light
that filters in from windows that ascend
thirty feet up or more
and paint the sunday light of may
in every hue and tint
on the oak benches
and marble floors
she dances in the quiet
like a candle flame come loose
from atop the wax
and crosses her hands as if to pray
and bows before a statue
that seems to smile
and pirouettes before another
that seems to stare
and plays a game
of hide and seek
in the mottled shadows
of the church
with no one there
and after the footfalls
of her hurried steps
have stopped and left
the lapsing moments
in the empty space
to the silent carvings
on the walls
she curls up in
a corner of the church
beneath a stained-glass window
that depicts the mystery of creation
and sleeps a sleep
beyond the reach of dreams
as the last rays of sunlight
setting through the mystery
touch her first communion