Repentance Again
repentance again
old women kneel in pews
dotted about the shadowed church
black splotches they float
among the incense clouds.
faces waxen like the flicker candles
raised, softened, in the stained glass light.
hands tightly curled into each other
black rosary beads clutched in woven need
black, black, scary black
repenting for the world of sin
carried in their voluminous souls.
timelessness pervades saturday confessions
it is all the days and nights of transgressions
large and small they roll down
the passages of life
to be laid at the feet of god
well oiled with words of penance.
ritual, mea culpa, contrition chanted.
scrubbed clean as their kitchens,
one by one they arise, genuflect
and disappear into secularity.
Copyright © Patricia Cresswell | Year Posted 2017
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