Prayers, Portraits, Post-Its (12)

“We will pray for you”

It is the hush of the voice, that mindful
dip, matching the psalm of the fan while you made
your confession, its soft measured slap
keeping your raw noise to lawful shape,
that, more than the five bare words, shocks you awake–
Look up:
mercy should shatter no less than sin:
take in with battered gaze this calm pale face,
its straight brown hair, brown eyes, firm delicate chin–
All about you rears this giant breathing
space, exhaling like an animal,
the poise and bend of its far bricks and wood
return you to all those way stations
you entered and filled. You were their heart:
beating with every second to arrive and depart.