The action of light makes the silhouette

In graveyards we pass,
carved angels dripping with rain—

their color the color of stone
rubbed with lichen, blue shadows of long

abandonment. Their robes mimic
the softness of forms we know,

an idea of shelter. The thought
that somewhere in a house

at the end of a road,
there might be a clean

change of clothes, a box
by the door where sopping shoes

might be shed. How does one learn
to exchange one form for another,

to make room for some recourse
not even visible yet?

Some angels have the round
faces of children; cascading curls,

the unselfconsciousness of a body
that has not yet shed its easy

fat. Others are blueprint or
abstraction, holding a lyre,

a scroll; a book with graven
letters, one of them perhaps

the cipher to that world
beyond this rain-drenched one.

 

In response to Via Negativa: Holy relic.

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