The Unattempted Flight
Somewhere beyond my mind an unmarked grave
Contains a nun, or what is left of her.
Somewhere beyond a chapel’s little nave,
In convent grounds, the nun is now a slur
Of rotted body parts and stains on bones.
But even if the hole that hides her held
A cross set up inside a fence of stones,
It could not justify how she had quelled
The soaring passions she once felt beneath
Those dark pink aureoles upon her breasts.
Perhaps some visitor will place a wreath
There on the grave where calmed vehemence rests.
..A single eagle feather lies there on the tomb.
….The pinion marks one sacred, empty womb.
Here is a quote from a travel article about a Greek island right next to Turkey that I read
on the bus going home. One sentence said, of a visit to an abandoned monastery/ nunnery,
"a single eagle feather had come to rest on the unmarked grave of a nun."