a
kirk
spire
against
blue sky points
to a heaven of mystery
more distant than weather
bare-headed
people look down
for want of vision
as rain falls
soul-stricken blindness
makes every step to salvation
stagger on the churchstones
a
ray
of light
penetrates
the stained-glass worship
halos of reflected glory settle
on heads bowed over open hymnals
in the crowded pews
silent as the pit people think of roast dinners
god forgotten in the secular sleep of afternoon
and in the late haste of evening
the clocks tick on to monday
bleakness descends wherever people go
because duty compels them
going where the pulpit screams its message
to break the silence of their deaf- and dumb-ness
piety in dark suits frowns its sunday-best
scowls under its broad-brimmed hats
at wrist-watchers sweetshop-provided faithless fools
and rages at those with the idle and their impatience
who wait for the retiring bell to release them
who hear the wind’s furtive whisper
who thank god for an end to sermons
who go with nods and winks and hats
tipped to faces smirking in gobstopped glee
as they pass the minister
in his vicarious robes
their once-best shoes tapping out
the numbered footsteps
between kirk and home
© BH, 2020
This flowered out of my own memory: the sunday feeling of being slowly enclosed again by everything before the week began again. Kirk-sundays, suits and sunday-school sweeties and the black-clad elders, the congregation and Nec Tamen Consumebatur ablaze above the minister and his pulpit.
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