Lent with Van Gogh, part 7

"Pietà"

Hello, Poetry Friend

There is a Pieta in the back of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Fredericksburg, Texas. It was erected in gratitude for the 83 young men of the parish who went to off to World War I and returned home safely.

One day, following Reconciliation, the priest told me to go pray at the Pieta — to tell Jesus and Mary what I’d just told him and then just listen.

The only sound was the light.

This is Holy Week. As a church musician and choir member, this week is a blur of notes, sung in three languages. There has been purple. There will be red. There will be darkness and silence before Easter Vigil, awash with long-buried Alleluias.

And here is Van Gogh, oh so blue!

Pietà, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889, Van Gogh Museum

I recently had a poem featured in Solum Journal, in their issue on doubt. As I was reading through the collection of thoughtful writing, I found these lines in a poem about Van Gogh titled “What Vincent Couldn’t See” by Tabitha Yeatts:

Not faith that entire museums

will be devoted to their work,

but confidence in an unknown person

for whom your efforts will be a spark,

I assume Vincent has been a spark for Yeatts. He has certainly been a spark for me. Especially in this Lent, that has felt oh so Lenty, when my most reliable source for hope has been this artist.

While I was doodling the word “hope,” I realized that if you write it backward, it’s almost the word “epoch.” All it lacks is the scimitar of a “c.” So then I looked up “epoch,” and it does not mean what I thought it meant:

• cessation, pause, hold back

• an instant; less than a period and greater than an age [a geological definition, but super cool]

• begins a new period of development, marked by significant events.

Callie Feyen is the queen of As-In poems. (Kwame Alexander is the king.) So here is my As In poem for the word “epoch.”

epoch

(noun)
- a cessation, a pause
- geological: less than a period and greater than an age
- an event that begins a new period of development

As in: fourth grade, waiting for Santa, your familiar December 
epoch suddenly gets a little longer when your little brother 
(yes, little brother) spills the candy canes on ol' St. Nick.

As in waiting for that first kiss on that second date—
the epoch between sitting beside him on moonlit rocks
beside the river and finally: goodnight at the door.

As in while waiting for whatever it is you’re waiting for, 
you open your hymnal at random, 
usher in a whole new epoch.

–Megan Willome

Next week: “Tree Roots.” One last piece of Van Gogh goodness to usher you into the long and Glorious Easter season.

P.S. During this series I am writing ekphrastic poems — poems inspired by art. If you’d like to write a poem from this week’s Van Gogh painting, please share in the comments.

Happy poeming!

Megan