I hated myself
No, that’s not quite right
I cursed my lack of self

Swaddled within the soft unyielding
Walls of the Holy Roman Catholic Apostolic —
Our Holy Mother —
The One, the only, the Church!

And what a mother she was
Those big firm breasts
Soft and unyielding 
Those generous nipples
Blushing roseola 
Swollen
Gazing straight at me
Promising eternal life if I
Just drank forever content
And sleepy, between those
Wondrous breasts

“Sshh, don’t cry out, dear child, don’t question
Here’s my nipple — drink deep and sleep —
As your Blessed Savior did —
Between my beguiling
Bewitching bedeviling breasts.”

Hallelujah 
For silver-lighted leaves 
Of evergreen nandina 
In my neighbor’s backyard

Hallelujah 
For noisy silence of bossy cardinals
Like princes of the church
Trying – always – to claim exclusive ownership
Of the bird feeder outside our bedroom window

(Natural born patriarchs
With no discernible wisdom
But lots of self-assured hallelujahs)

Hallelujah for me
Though I be but a plain brown sparrow
Yet I continue to claim my equal right
To the feeder
Singing hallelujah 
For 77 years of perching
Feeding
Returning
Sharing 
Swaying bird feeders
Suspended from squirrel-proof poles

Life increasingly
Becomes
Leaving behind the once
While holding onto the love

Here be not monsters
But eternity

The sometimes wild
Excesses of youth

The always insistent 
Demands of mid life

Even the necessary new
Realities of aging

Those challenges belong
But to the past

The present challenge
Carries forward
The love
From past to present
From memory to celebration

Celebration
For all that has been
Will be
Must be
Left behind
While love remains my reality