Doria Pamphilj Gallery, Rome.
This might not be what it seems. The angel,
his violin song, Joseph’s knuckled hands,
all this glow, sweet fix of eyes that plumb
a heaven: all mere threads of the artist’s urge.
That faint line between her soft eyebrows tells:
dream-space is spent. Gravest gravity pulls.
Baby’s fallen into need that cannot wait, merges
with his mother’s cradling arcs and hollows.
Follow the curls of a filigreed ear that hears
the said and unsaid, sears truth and lies. Strange
heaven, shrouded by drear sky and brooding.
The two luminous beauties? They’re asleep
in Herod’s murky air, mad Herod, who dreads
toddlers. One will kill him, he’s sure. He’ll
kill them all first. That ass, too dull to run,
ought to be a winged steed, speeding them
to safety. But look: he just pokes his head
between Joseph and the angel. The manger?
Nowhere. Home? Gone. Time’s tenderest
prodigy is lost to sleep. One day, as we know,
when he’s grown, he will find the lost, wake
the dead. But here?
All dreams have been dreamt.
Johanna Caton, O.S.B., is a Benedictine nun from Minster Abbey in Kent, England. Born in Virginia, she lived in the United States until adulthood, when her monastic vocation took her to England. She writes poetry as a means of understanding the work of God in her life, whose purposes and presence can be elusive until viewed through the more accommodating lens of art and poetry. Her poetry has appeared or will appear in Green Hills Literary Lantern, Time of Singing Christian Poetry Journal, The Ekphrastic Review, The Christian Century, Amethyst Review and other venues. She is a 2020 Pushcart Prize nominee.