All that it takes to remember that I am still with you
is this morning’s sun, glaring from a clear blue sky

and I have never absconded, never left your side
even when I found myself at the edge of the field

merely a part of your life’s curious appurtenances,
someone you’d remember when the muezzin calls

from his minaret, or angelus intoned from emporia
microphones, or when the dry season lends penitence

its hauteur from random worshippers of a crucifixion
forgotten in the hill of skulls, a mocking flagelation.

I will be there when litanies of pain fill your evenings,
I will be there when you lose all faith in love or dreams.

At the edge of the field, I will be there, waiting for you
in the shadows, until you finally stop running away from me.

—Albert B. Casuga

a sacro