[Lent: day 19/40]

[hermionesviolin]

What Are the Days?
-Colette Inez

They are pilferers
stealing our resolve,
Thomas broods aloud.

Or stones
to use for good or ill,
says James sitting
on a rock with Peter.

Soon, Jesus
comes along saying:
all days are our brothers.

Aren't days fish
swimming to shore?
asks Simon, the fisherman
mending his nets.

They are coins to hoard
or to spend, Judas frowns,
and looks at his palms.

Twaddle, says Martha
running to fix supper.
You talkers, get me a hen,
get me an egg.

I bet you think
all the days are women
pouring wine and honey.

They are what they are,
says the hammerer of nails,
securing thieves
and Jesus to the cross,
nothing more.

from Sweet Jesus: Poems About the Ultimate Icon (ed. Nick Carbó and Denise Duhamel) p. 117-8.

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sangerin mentioned recently how, "Technically, Sundays aren't part of Lent, and therefore are a break from whatever Lenten Discipline one has decided to follow."  While part of me validates and can even theoretically get behind the idea of Feast Days during Desert Days, this has also always disconcerted me.  However, it occurs to me that this means I'm gonna hit "40/40" when Holy Week starts.  I could just call it quits at that point, but there are poems I've already selected for wanting to use at the end of Holy Week.  Sigh.