Viaticum

Regarding the shuffling shapes in the room,

they watched him given food for the journey.

They saw two kinds harmonise in the mouth

to revive an old body and its blood.

 

Sinner ministered to sinner; the shapes

understood. But they also knew that food

came from work carried out, and not from sin.

And so silence was added to silence.

 

And to another silence: the silence

that spoke in the shadows while evil went

unpunished. This was not a condition

for prayer, but an absence of the Word.

 

The room emptied; the sinners united

at the death. A light penance was imposed,

and reciprocated by a dark stare

that probed the soul, seeking shame and sorrow.