The Butler Pennsylvania Poems
Franklin Street
Franklin Street was
our cool cathedral to play in
vaulted high in green
with shards of light
breaking through leafy windows
to fall on mosaics
of brownish-yellow bricks
along shaded sidewalks
flanked with patches of green,
behind which one house stood
that might have been a chapel
with three steps leading up
to where flowers threw off scents
like plumes of incense
giving access to a narrow nave
at whose distant end
a lone stained glass window
glowed reddish orange
as if for Vespers or Lauds.
We played differently there
under that arching canopy
celebrating our rituals
with quiet fervor in restrained games,
in a sanctuary more suited for prayer
between eight mighty pillars
flanking the nave, evenly spaced
bearing the weight of the arches—
or were they oaks?
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Franklin Street
Franklin Street was
our cool cathedral to play in
vaulted high in green
with shards of light
breaking through leafy windows
to fall on mosaics
of brownish-yellow bricks
along shaded sidewalks
flanked with patches of green,
behind which one house stood
that might have been a chapel
with three steps leading up
to where flowers threw off scents
like plumes of incense
giving access to a narrow nave
at whose distant end
a lone stained glass window
glowed reddish orange
as if for Vespers or Lauds.
We played differently there
under that arching canopy
celebrating our rituals
with quiet fervor in restrained games,
in a sanctuary more suited for prayer
between eight mighty pillars
flanking the nave, evenly spaced
bearing the weight of the arches—
or were they oaks?
Next Home
Comment