by Katie Joy Nellis
I have lost count of years, and today
they do not matter
at all.
To the young, years are important;
to we who wait so long,
each added hour feeds our small
abyss, waiting for His greater one
to swallow up the whole.
There is no counting
love or prayers on fingers.
Everything is given, heady
with abandon,
even if the gasps of wonder at it
rasp out like a senile
cough.
They hear me laugh, cackle,
'The old prophetess,
she has worn away her mind at last
with all that prayer and fasting.'
But I see blazing in the wraps
at the pap of His mother
the kingly one,
the one the stars are singing for,
drooling, wide-eyed, pink-fingered
perfection.
Children of today are solemn things;
I am happier than they.