At the Door (WC)

 

(Wendy Cabell, January 28, 2022, feast day of the Totemsk-Sumorin Icon of the Mother of God, and of (above) Blessed Olympia Bida (communist Eastern Europe), Saint Ephraim the Syrian, Saint Isaac the Syrian, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Cannera of Inis Cathaig, Saint Constantly, Saint Julian of Cuenca, Blessed Maria Luisa Montesinos Orduna,  and Saint Radegonde of Celles. Image from here.)

At the Door

(for my great grandmother Elizabeth Otten, of blessed memory) 

A nudge, last minute instructions: “ When you sense a door opening in 

you, enter”. So she does. Props it open with the Rosary in her pocket.

Pocket reached for, Aves, in snatched moments. Bustling feet in her 

restaurant–-no hindrance. Nor the slackened step this night, 1935. Click

of “Closed” sign, bill of sale. Not to be, back door ladling of soup 

(like Saint Elizabeth) but a nudge to continue and be gradually

different. Switch to manager, pass down recipes for dumplings,

winter stew. One hand out to descendents (Rosaries

in pockets) feeling for the doorframe in

unison--

Now Open

*From combined prompts: Freewrite as inspired by Czeslaw Milosz’s Late Ripenes (whose “I felt a door opening in me and I entered” was quoted/adapted, above), and John Asbery’s Late Echo (whose “to continue and be gradually different”  is quoted, above). From Lisa Freedman's BreatheReadWrite, January 28, 2022.