At a distance:
seemingly intact piers,
dark recesses, blind arcades.

Nearer, the sky
pours through arches,
a drizzle of rain inside the nave,
the passage crumbling,
open to grass and grazing sheep.

On good days,
strokes of sun the trespasser,
devastation given a kind of splendor,

the strobe lights of memory
playing out impressions of a tower
you know is not there,

nor are the bells,
nor the stalls, nor choir,
not one finger tapping time
on the carved arms of chairs
or intertwined

here the church,
here the steeple,
open the door-

no vaulting hosannas, the chalice
and wine of remembrance
long removed,

as were the tapestries,
as was the incense of flesh
not yet carrion, not yet stringing off
into sorrow, base silence.