May 31 : The Visitation

They call this Our Lady's park
and a few half-opened roses
reluctantly lift to the tulip
and ginkgo trees an almost
colorless stare. There is peace
of a kind in this small elliptical green,

The Visitation, Joignt

and shade from the glare beating on white-faced apartments that front the noisy street. I have reached in my beads the second joyful mystery, recalling the gay young John's clean jump, Elizabeth's awe at her cousin's faith, the quiet of Ain Karem
where Zachary lived.
Children are playing hide-and-go-seek in the streets. A frantic mother calls: "David,
watch out!" and two unecstatic pigeons, red-eyed and fat,
waddle ahead of me
pecking the grass for bugs
and make domestic quarrel over
an unemotional worm.
Between Hail Mary's I see sheddings of sycamore bark
disorderly on the ground, and remember
that such unmistakable prosaic things
must have been frequently juxtaposed
in Our Lady's heart,
where fullness of grace does not scorn
the sycamore leaving   
our tired humanity hands
to her healing joy.

Anna Mae Marheikecke rscj
Province of the United States