Seven Candles


I lit seven candles at church today
and laid them out in a little row,
tiny lights burning single file
and silently recited seven Hail Marys for you.

But if you were here, you'd say
don't believe in that stuff
like you'd say it's just bread, it's just wine
or how Mary was a girl, not divine
how I'd look at my hands ,
I'd say "map," you'd say "lines",
how I'd shuffle cards,
I'd say "path", you'd roll eyes and sigh.

It's the river, this faith, this soft wave,
the Holy Ghost and its Holy See,
that sails me slowly out to sea and so
you say
I'm but fish not good enough to pull a net up and catch
because of kind of water I breathe in, believe in.

Or was it you
who wanted
to lift her hands
and soar away upwards
to places I can't reach, with song I can't hear,
and unfit to sing?

All I know is I lit seven candles,
and sang in me a small hymn
watching them burn slow,
tiny stars that might lead you back to me.


current music: Get Here - as sung by Camil Labog