Sunday Statues

“Pietà” by Michelangelo

 

marble preachers
deliver their sermons
wordlessly speaking
through sculpture to
lately diminishing masses
depicting dimensions
exemplars of fealty and faith
reverential esthetics
a hushed iconography
coaxing ambivalent souls
to the purpose of prayer
to that peaceable interlude
quiet with dialogue
man with his God
private personal words
amid liturgies scripted
and publically joined

 

catholic artforms who tend
to offend plainer
protestant ministries
argue commandments
interpreted even to point
of iconoclast wars
schisms east and west
old and new ruptures
along the same route
Michelangelo traced with
the consummate grace of
his hammers and chisels
straight into the rebirth
of reverence for creations
by creatures the Creator
has made sculpture either
of flesh or of stone likewise
settles my ancestral soul

 

 

From my book Ephemera

Palms

“Entry of Christ into Jerusalem” by Wilhelm Morgner

 

enter triumph

sweet unto Zion

sandaled peace

gently mounted

fragrant fronds

placate paths

to the passion

redemption by

mortified flesh

the beginning

of the end of

the beginning

 

 

From my books Inside the Smoke and Legacies (vol. 2)

Sunday Statues

“Pietà” by Michelangelo

marble preachers
deliver their sermons
wordlessly speaking
through sculpture to
lately diminishing masses
depicting dimensions
exemplars of fealty and faith
reverential esthetics
a hushed iconography
coaxing ambivalent souls
to the purpose of prayer
to that peaceable interlude
quiet with dialogue
man with his God
private personal words
amid liturgies scripted
and publically joined

catholic artforms who tend
to offend plainer
protestant ministries
argue commandments
interpreted even to point
of iconoclast wars
schisms east and west
old and new ruptures
along the same route
Michelangelo traced with
the consummate grace of
his hammers and chisels
straight into the rebirth
of reverence for creations
by creatures the Creator
has made sculpture either
of flesh or of stone likewise
settles my ancestral soul

 

 

(originally posted January 2015)

Papá

Papa c. 1938

 

there once lived a man

a truly good man

the only man ever

in the history of popes

of prelates and pilgrims

to walk

with stout legs of a horseman

healthy and hale

fearless with faith

upon Bernadette’s path

and into the grotto

where he knelt in devotion

and prayed

then arose

with emergent affliction

a permanent

cripple

mocked by the castoff

crutches and braces

festooning that shrine

it happened

so sayeth the scriptures

by his bitterless hand

in the bible

bearing our names

it happened

in the year of our Lord

when I was conceived

his auxiliary legs

 

 

(originally posted April 2013 – one of many poems I wrote for my father)

Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart

Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart

 

(This spectacular church is located in my boyhood home city of Newark, New Jersey. It sits majestically on a rise across the street from where I attended high school. My sister was married here more nearly sixty years ago. It is world renowned as both an architectural and ecclesiastical jewel. It’s always had a special place in my heart.)

 

Clerestory windows
Admit into transepts
Heaven’s own light
With agnostic rays
Refracted by doubts

Flying buttresses thrust
From chancel and nave
Transmuting gravity
Through high gothic vaults
Into repentance

Three stained-glass rose panes
Compelling in scale
Adorn forceful façades
Carved from granite quartz stone
Dressed to tolerate sin

Baldacchino and pulpit
Fine-sculpted white marble
Pronounce sacred words
Steeped in mystery’s echo
Profane ears can hear

The Christ and His altar
Pink-born of Carrara
Host the Eucharist
Rapture that ruptures
What evil may linger

Eleven side chapels
Accommodate worship
Of indigenous ethnic
Eminent figures in the
Catholic pantheon

Limestone-clad narthex
Envelopes in welcome
Those hesitant hearts
Or incomplete souls
To share in the rites

Two magnificent towers
Evoke fourteenth-century
Pealing their calls
Across urban miles
Distracted by toil

Huge Roman bronze doors
Usher in thousands
To worship and pray
In this hallmark of art
In this landmark to faith

 

Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart

 

 

 

(originally posted April 2013)

Papá

Papa
c. 1938

there once lived a man

a truly good man

the only man ever

in the history of popes

of prelates and pilgrims

to walk

with stout legs of a horseman

healthy and hale

fearless with faith

upon Bernadette’s path

and into the grotto

where he knelt in devotion

and prayed

then arose

with emergent affliction

a permanent

cripple

mocked by the castoff

crutches and braces

festooning that shrine

it happened

so sayeth the scriptures

by his bitterless hand

in the bible

bearing our names

it happened

in the year of our Lord

when I was conceived

his auxiliary legs

 

 

(originally posted April 2013 – one of many poems I wrote for my father)

Panis Angelicus

“Healing Angel” by Breten Bryden

 

helplessness
wanting wings
takes the bread
of redemption

anticipates grace
through doxology
chanted in
penitent tones

feeling fortified
exits the doors
to a growingly
secular world

(originally posted November 2013)

Knights of Columbus

 

“Crocefisso No. 9” by William G. Congdon

 

 

Neat-laid baldrics sling scabbard clad swords
Jeweled medallions and full-plumed chapeaus
Silken capes and white gloves all compose
The regalia of knights who kneel towards
The bright light of the true Lord of lords

Serving Charity to those in need
Pledging Unity of their devotion
And Fraternity through their promotion
Of a Patriotism by deed
That ensures free expression of creed

 

 

(originally posted December 2013)

Bildungsroman

Emblem of The Bildungsroman Project

catholic catechist
landing the lessons of faith
upon adolesced ears
sacramental instruction
ritual secrets revealed
doctrine drawn upon
still pristine canvas
charts limned with the
ancient laid paths to salvation

a boy on new knees in old pews
turning round in his mind
the curricular scripture
the sacred traditions
the solemn-most teachings
of rote magisterium
blessings of knowledge
his father’s blunt questions
his mother’s devotions

new minted emergent adult
pulls away from his grace
carries into a secular world
an agnostic propensity
walking a wilderness
three decades deep
come to find on the other side
peace with a boyhood religion
still holding his soul in its hands

Confessional

“Reconciliation” by Daniela Isache

(Originally posted February 2014)
 

sin sweats in my shoes
fragrant as the Eden tree
incense and penance