Two Poems

WE CLOSE OUR EYES TO ANSELM AND LIE CALM

Remember how, at seven years, the decrees
were brought home: child-soul must register
for Christ's dole, be allotted its first Easter,
blanch-white and empty, chilled by the lilies,

bridling amid the well-wishers and spies.
Reverend Mother, breakfastless, could feast her
constraint on terracotta and alabaster
...