A Poem by Sinéad Wilson

Relics

When death rapped at our door as often as a birth,
and crossed our threshold bearing visions and scorched limbs,
we villagers sought comfort in the relics of our church:
kissed lips against Our Lady’s pettiskirt, ran thumbs
along St Philip’s aged heel, frangible as a chaffinch egg.
That summer, when the crops had failed,
our trembling monks lugged the sandal of Saint James
on a silver dais through withered rye. I’d like to claim
from then the miracles came thick and fast, but as is said,
Sometimes Our Lord He gives; sometimes He takes away.
And though undone at first by hunger’s pangs,
we had the spectacle to roseate our thoughts
those famished days and nights: that old thong
bobbing on its throne through tawny ears of grain.

Sinéad Wilson lives in Tunbridge Wells and is Head of English at a secondary school in East Sussex. A chapbook of her poems, The Glutton’s Daughter (2005), was published by Donut Press. She is currently working on her first collection.