An afternoon of rain
over clusters of trees
with leaves and flowers
peeling off from the boughs
to the grassy ground:
how it wafts a smell not earthy
but sweet, even sacred –
the incense of benediction
the candle flames at both sides of the altar,
the garden of roses on the marbled floor,
even the breath of the priest
prompting Tantum Ergo;
how too the unending pitter-patter
drowns out screeching, honking engines
hushing the grind of life
like a litany of prayers
learned as a child.
Is it the mind just meandering lonely
to a long ago
or is it the soul being awakened
to an overdue bath
after many summers
of weeds and wastes?
A whole afternoon of rain
no regrets over schedules missed
and hours sitting it out.
I will come off it
a fresh morning dew
from the smiling sky.
Footnote: Tantum Ergo, from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
The Latin text of “Tantum Ergo” sung to its traditional melody, which is a mode I Gregorian chant.
“Tantum ergo” is the incipit of the last two verses of Pange lingua, a Medieval Latin hymn generally attributed to St Thomas Aquinas c. 1264, but based by Aquinas upon various earlier fragments. The “Genitori genitoque” and “Procedenti ab utroque” portions are adapted from Adam of Saint Victor’s sequence for Pentecost. The hymn’s Latin incipit literally translates to “Therefore so great”.
The singing of the Tantum ergo occurs during veneration and benediction of the Blessed Sacrament in the Catholic Church and other denominations that have this devotion. It is usually sung, though solemn recitation is sometimes done, and permitted.