Monday, March 7, 2022

Looking Into Mary Valentine

Her coat of arms when she had been
A soldier-abbess in her middle ages
Surrounded by her muffled prayers
Might have displayed a greenish turtle
Swaying through her busy days
And up in the right-hand corner a silver owl
Listening all night for her mate
Both painted on a golden ground
With a serious-looking lake in silk
Embroidered between them
Or in a less churlish time a boyish
Ephesian girl tending her father's flock
When she was first learning how
To hold us all in her heart

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