I am the wind-blown falcon hanging high above the bending pines
with olives ranked upon the rocks and crags, deep shadowed in the steep inclines.
Hung high and braced against clear air my quivered pinions hold me there
above the dome and whitewashed walls and bell tower on the Puig de Missa.
And then I swing with windsweep flow to hide from men my mastered show
while summer's midday heat shimmers over billowed sails and distant crystal sea.
And man reposed makes his retreat to dine in lower comfort seat below a wind-flapped canopy, cooler breezed and heavy eyed, at ease, while I again compose my hanging glide with searching eyes that see his close, I see it all below me.
when she found out he had been calling her Nussy to
make her look in the meaning of the words she said.
he said she sweded curses onto people ears
and made them feel sorry about themselves.
stop calling that woman Nussy. Do you know
what that means. She refused answer. Once we we had company
I spoke against her in front of others
saying she still Speaks foul of those she is said to love
"don't you" she refused to answer. And then when
we were alone she called me a no-account
who liked to cause discomfort to the people she is said to love
and she looked at me and asked me why.
Mister Griffastone Missa
0001 Dollbaby Lane
Dillcrest Heights MO.
000001
she talked to her dollbaby when she is trying to figure
out what to tell her husband. He said she had been having an affair
and she became foolishly mean and contrite. She stopped seeing her lover
and began speaking to the dollbaby she had been giving to
her by her brother, when she was a child.
Lucky day! Father McShane was on the altar.
I knelt in gratitude, in silent applause.
He said mass faster than the lead car in a drag race.
Hosts flew and before we knew it: “Ite, missa est.” *
The nine a.m. ritual was well worth it on Sundays with daddy.
Out of the mist of sneezy incense, enclosed in glass tabernacles
food for the soul of another kind awaited us at the Brewster bakery.
Father and daughter a spiritual team of confectionary communicants,
were in search of the one true doughnut, the absolute muffin.
My father kept us ever faithful.
*Go, the Mass is ended
©Kathryn McLoughlin Collins
June 14, 2012