THIS morning Father Blake will bless us all, the stairs, the maids, the almond cake, the antlers in the hall. Other sinners may choose mighty Easter Day, with all its panoply of candlelight and choir. I would not so aspire. Crown enough for me is this, the vigil — when the altar is lit with flowers again, when Lenten vows do not yet falter, when grievous purple that has lain so bleakly on each statue's face comes down to show the grace of laundered haloes worn by saints, and church, which was a penance-place, becomes Spring's messenger. The smell of paints, dust flying, carpets out to air, boards scrubbed, bright brass and sticky varnish and work of women everywhere — to-day's home-relics will not tarnish though I am bad and old. Though I am bad and far they will be as they are, like fragments from a robe of gold, or like the small birds echoing hosannas that angelic trumpets ring. To-day the buds awake and from the orchard pigeons call. This morning Father Blake will bless us all. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ABOVE HALF MOON by JAMES GALVIN HIGH PLAINS RAG by JAMES GALVIN A PARADOX by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON |