I have a son who barely knows his name
He’s just an infant and
at nightfall he resists
the death of consciousness
as though his very life’s at stake;
Each morning finds him here awake,
exhaustion haven won.
And some small part of that small mind
Remembers.
Trust is a cathedral
and the craftsmen pay in blood
for every devastation, beauty
and transcendence cut
in limestone; faithful and long
suffering, unturning, each one strains
against the task intractable
with tears, contortions adamant
Till spent
Each father’s final fall becomes the glory
of his son, and so
Ascends each stone and stair
Each window, buttress, aisle and crypt:
The holy blood and body
Given in trust
Returned by morning’s steadfast breath.
Ten thousand times a daily death
And perhaps
We yet might learn to live.