Someone has placed plastic flowers on the grave
Of a baby who died 143 years ago
The petals are yellow and wet with morning dew.
In the distance a hurt animal cries and the leaves dance
to its misery, while the sunlight pokes through its prison of clouds,
Saying Shh this is nature’s reckoning.
Inside the church, my son is holding a sermon to himself
My daughter is playing the piano and singing softly,
More prayer than song,
The battleground she’s made of her body swaying with each note.
Hope floats through the dogwood air
and hits the pews below and the archways above.
I have seen the Notre Dame and its replica in Montreal
I have seen the Taj Mahal in its symmetrical splendor
But I have never felt closer to God than now.
