The knobbled grassy tussocks we walked on
May be the swelling graves of monks, derided, gone.
The vertical calls out in one high wall
A fiery blackbird makes the final call.
The plainchant praising G-d has charged the air
For us who don’t entomb our inner ear
The sacred music floats away like leaves
Bewitched and married by an autumn breeze
We stood in silence, viscerally stunned
The river was as clear as love’s demands
And still, in my mind’s eye, I see that stream
I am held by the imagined Abbey’ in shared dreams
An elegiac moment caught in words
Entranced by symbols like the darting birds
How my heart sings 