Carmelite
Carmelite
Lalini Shanela Ranaraja
We were frequently late for the Gloria.
The convent garden made you ravenous–
careening towards the bougainvillea, pretending
to cram your hoodie with clippings while I laughed
too much to stifle you, finagling our shoes
onto the verandah with the same finesse I deployed to park the car. As you led the way inside
with that confidence whose origin remains unsolved,
I would lean into the grotto, exchange knowing looks
with Mary. Believe me, I understand!
I still don’t know where mine gets it.
Last summer I found the journal you kept during those years;
you wrote people worship here when they tire of the pageantry
of grander places. Before then, this was where
I thought you happiest in prayer–
your fingertips skimming the lemongrass walls,
your feet gentle with the red clay floors, one of your palms
always clasping a pew, fond as the hand you laid
to your best friend’s cheek that second-to-last Tuesday,
before I came in with the tea tray.
This is where we come when our faith is dying
or when we die of faith. By then, you weren’t always
certain of the date, so I don’t know when you felt
this way. Was it after you first tried? Before the diagnosis?
After you started sleeping all of Sunday
or the week you walked here by yourself?
The novice who’d seen you was startled and puzzled–
that week they'd gathered river rocks and adorned them
with verses, and you transcribed every single one. Then you sat under the frangipani tree, didn’t move
for so long she thought you’d fallen asleep. When she came back
with the prioress, you were gone; months later
she recognized your photo in the paper.
I stole a calla lily today. I was late for the Gloria
and callas grow on every continent save Antarctica
but they were newly planted and you wouldn’t have
missed your chance. I sat on the verandah
still wearing my shoes. Mary and I didn’t need to talk.
I was double parked and dwarfed by one of your hoodies;
there was a gel pen in the pocket. Your journal pages
from the day the novice saw you were tangled like a thicket,
offering just one legible sentence. I unfurled the lily like parchment.
This is where I run from the silence of my soul.
Lalini Shanela Ranaraja
Poet & Researcher
Lalini has been published in Wildness, Hunger Mountain Review, Transition and Sky Island Journal. She is passionate about social justice advocacy, campus ministry, and community-building. You can read more of her work at www.shanelaranaraja.com.
Photography by Evie Shaffer