Slave to the Virgin
       

Matt Talbot walked Dublin
with crushed glass in his socks.
With barbed wire around his chest.
Chains wrapped his right arm
and knee, cords on the other side.
Hid these bindings beneath his clothes.
Crossed the city's river moving from mass
to mass this way because he found himself
a slave to the Virgin.

Carried bricks for a living. Made alms
of what he earned. Slept only
on a plank. Kept but a timber
for his pillow. Never swore.
Took the pledge. No tobacco. Told no one
how he lived for pride in devotion
he thought the most devious sin of them all.

Bound his body to learn his body.
Learned his body to forget
his body. How else to get to empty.
How else to reach freedom but by journey.
Back and forth across the waters
beneath the monkey puzzle trees.
Walked quickly. Head down.
How else to approach her
but with a tested heart made toom.

slave amn't I. My body a coffle
chained in one world
driven to the next. There's mornings
I think of heaving me
over the bridge. Nights I dream
I cross the river north
to hide myself from myself.
To keep me off my trail.

But there's no smarts in that.
This river runs a knife
that guts the city's middle.
These monkeys cross it daily
forever looking down.

Amn't I a slave to the Virgin.
Amn't I a hod-carrier for the Lord.

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Copyright © 2013 Tanya Olson All rights reserved
from Boyishly
Yes Yes Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission