St. Luke at Nazareth

In those days, in the quiet waiting after the waiting was done,
In a little house, stone and wood smoothed with the sort of wear
Only generations can give –
You show me a child’s bowl.
Turn it over in your wrinkled hands, remembering the softer ones
That once held it, a high voice exclaiming thanks
To a silent, smiling father.
He held his tools like you do your words.
And all the while, the story pours from you like milk and honey –
This house was once an angel’s rest, and I imagine
The low rafters still faintly glow with divine luminescence,
The same spark in both your eyes.

You ask if I’m hungry, and I want to shout it –
“Yes! I am starved for every word you speak and glance you give
And for the presence of your Son, who has gone but who feels
So here in these walls and in every laugh line in your face.”
But you offer me bread.
This work of your strong body is warm and breaks so easily in two
And I know somehow more clearly
That I am not worthy to enter under this roof.

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Katie Boord is an emerging poet from Kansas. She works in a geology lab by day, and sings in an indie rock band by night. Her poems have been published in Heart of Flesh Literary Journal and Poetry Super Highway.