In graveyards we pass,
carved angels dripping with rain—
their color the color of stone
rubbed with lichen, blue shadows of long
abandonment. Their robes mimic
the softness of forms we know,
an idea of shelter. The thought
that somewhere in a house
at the end of a road,
there might be a clean
change of clothes, a box
by the door where sopping shoes
might be shed. How does one learn
to exchange one form for another,
to make room for some recourse
not even visible yet?
Some angels have the round
faces of children; cascading curls,
the unselfconsciousness of a body
that has not yet shed its easy
fat. Others are blueprint or
abstraction, holding a lyre,
a scroll; a book with graven
letters, one of them perhaps
the cipher to that world
beyond this rain-drenched one.
In response to Via Negativa: Holy relic.