To Marie Antoinette, from a Girl Only One-Half Catholic
Kelly R. Samuels
Incense is what I best remember and how vast
the space felt – columns guiding the eye to
where the ceiling was sometimes painted blue.
My grandfather would kneel and cross himself – gestures I
only dimly understood. As with fasting
until after, our walk home too bright, too dizzying.
November meant all the leaves had fallen
from the trees and the dead had already risen for
their one night – not this day of your birth.
Nor feasting for all the souls with the chapels draped
in black. Sad faces. Treading softly. Making way
for the wafer and the wine as I sat
in the pew – too young, not enough of
ever.
The neighboring earth
shook
while your mother worked at
where to place yet another girl. All the eves of
the years to come muted in celebration.
Kelly R. Samuels is a Best of the Net and two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, as well as the author of two chapbooks: Words Some of Us Rarely Use (Unsolicited) and Zeena/Zenobia Speaks (Finishing Line). Her poems have recently appeared in RHINO, Cold Mountain Review, DMQ Review, The Pinch, and Quiddity. She lives in the Upper Midwest.