SPLENDENT

Opening one eye, Jerome sees that someone --
Probably Brigid -- has drawn a halo over his head.
It shines so that he cannot possibly sleep
No more can the others huddled against the cold
On the Seventh Avenue grating. The halo
Shifts colors as he watches it, never the same
For more than a few seconds. He lifts one finger,
Planning to undraw it but hesitates.
Finally, he adds triangle ears, a few whiskers,
Narrow eyes and an odd shape apparently meant
To include the nose and mouth, It lacks something;
One of the others offers an expiring cigarette
Which fits the mouth perfectly. The men
Pull the smoke around them and wait
For sleep to find them again.

NOT FAR FROM SNEDIKER AVENUE

My father's cat once found
An old halo, one of those Brigid
Used to impatiently draw
On the air with a long finger
And then hang over her head

NOTE

The fickle pensioners of Morpheus
Have their bars in the lower world
Which we call home. Dangerous once
They do little harm now. Brigid --
Saint, goddess and, most importantly,
Bartender -- occasionally does a miracle
And they sleep without dreaming

That once they were faithful.

HANGING OUT WITH THE GODDESS OF CORNERS

After several thousand years as a corpse goddess
Libitina is now, by a fiat of Google's,
The goddess of corners (You can look it up)
This both pleases and disconcerts her.
Corpses pointedly ignore her; she is uncertain
Of her new duties. Many of the prayers she gets
Were meant for other gods who, being homeless,
Are hard to find, while she's on every street-corner
Her support group includes St. Brigid
(Once a water spirit or perhaps fire incarnate.
Scholars disagree and she's no longer sure herself)
And  Orchil (Death goddess who minors in sorcery;
Also a gourmet cook. Invented by Standish O'Grady
In a fit of Irish patriotism, in 1893).

ANOTHER

The day after God made a rock
Too heavy for Him to lift,
Heaven vanished, along with
All who dwelt there except a bent seraph
Two dominions, an addled throne
And a handful of saints. Down the road
A duplicate Heaven, constructed
For just such an emergency,
Flickered to life. A few details were wrong;
There were more cats, to begin with.
Most of the occupants lacked wings
But flew by wildly flapping their arms.
In Peter's absence, St. Brigid
Took over the gate. For form's sake,
The God of this New Heaven maintains
An official residence there but usually
Spends His nights on Earth,
Lying on His Back, looking at the stars
Trying to remember if He'd made them.

CONTINUING

The story about Brigid everyone knows
Is of her hanging a cloak on a sunbeam.
Seldom is it remembered she could weave
With cold moonlight. Sometimes in her wrath
She would move three long fingers just so,
And a star guttered in its socket and died.
Before she was a saint she was the goddess
Of standing water. Her shift at the bar ends;
The ice in the machine tries to follow her out.

WAITING

My father's late for the rehearsal
So this poem's supporting cast -- a banshee,
Two cats, my grandmother, most
Of the 1939 Dodgers, Sts. Brigid and Jerome,
Jerome's lion and Hans Castorp --
Amuse themselves as best they can
Crowded into my grandmother's kitchen.
(It is 3 a.m., but she would've been awake
Even if I hadn't sent this crowd along)
The banshee tells a very involved joke
At which only my grandmother laughs
The cats debate proper ways to greet
The ghost of the last Ming Emperor
Who is said to be travelling with my father.
There is a noise outside, but it is only
Castor Oyl and J. Wellington Wimpy,
Players from Thimble Theater, hoping
For some work as extras in the poem.
The banshee is starting another joke:
"Nat Silver, the ghost of an emperor
And Li Po's shadow walk into a bar ..."

PATRONAGE

Patron of the poor! Also of poets,
Poultry farmers, printing presses,
Fugitives, babies, scholars,
Mariners, midwives and milkmaids!
All these and more is Brigid.
Somewhere, a poor scholarly poet,
All agrime with printer's ink,
With a baby under one arm
And a chicken under the other
Looks to flee the midwives' wrath
By taking to the sea. Alas for him!
Brigid also smiles on nuns
And blacksmiths. Even now,
A burly bride of Christ speaks a name
To the red metal of a new-forged sword.

AN OLD TALE

The story is well known: on a hot day

St. Brigid unfastened her cloak

And hung it on a sunbeam.

The beam was astonished; "I have crossed

96,260,000 miles,

(Give or take the odd foot or three),

Through trackless space at unthinkable speed

Only to find myself at last a coathook?"

"Don't blame me," said the cloak;"I had every intent

Of falling in a heap to the ground, perhaps

Picking up some dirt and leaves while there

But who has it in them to say no to Brigid?"