TRAVERTINE
In the hills I am hearing music - the sounds
of some large movement trudging along
the quarried slopes. All the caves of men
and the hands of yet a thousand more can
never cover the moment. The grotto of a
St. Xavier Pilene of the Mountain seems to
sit nearby - idle and barren, a place where
no crutches hang. I ask the monk who lives
nearby, 'what brought people here?' He replies,
'broken hands and limbs, mostly, those seeking
the remedy for getting limber again. Others there
were, yes, the amputees or the quarrymen who
severed an arm at the wrist or who'd lost an
arm or a leg. For them there never was any hope,
I knew that; though they all prayed to be made
whole again. Yes, this crazy religion business is
like that. They'd leave their money behind.'
-
A sidelong light enters the grotto - smokey and
dense, it floats along low to the ground, lit as it
is by the filtered light, diffused through the stained
glass of the windows. Candles still flutter, while
others are out, I sit a moment to sort things out.
What is it that men believe? How does it happen,
this way we both grieve and live, together? And
what is it we are afraid of at all? I do not bother
to answer myself - after all, it would be so foolish,
-
The stickle-hammer guards the cadenced lobby
wherein two Swiss-Guardsmen are standing. I
do not know why, nor what possible could be
on their minds, nor what they could
possibly be thinking of.
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