Communion Ghazal

Communion Ghazal

Renee Emerson

The church service in a high school gym: basketballs loose like stray prophets
while the sermon dissipates into the steel rafters. Grape juice, in lieu of wine.

“Maybe it was for the best he died” on the anniversary, she pours a glass of wine.
“Mawmaw says he walked the aisle at five,” and she pours another glass of wine.

To the Baptist potluck, you brought your famous sweet rolls baked that morning,
golden and light as a blessing on a newborn child. Late, I brought a poem of wine.

The sound machine hums an ocean in our hall, while I resist the need to feel
the rise and fall of everyone’s breath. The windows fill with night as dark as wine.

Of course, we are saved through death. What world would it be if we were saved
by faces gathered around a table, bread broken, laughter poured out like wine?

---

Renee Emerson
Poet

Renee is the author of the poetry collections Keeping Me Still (Winter Goose Publishing 2014), Threshing Floor (Jacar Press 2016), and Church Ladies (Fernwood Press 2023). She lives in the Midwest with her husband and five children. You can read more of her work at www.renee-emerson.com and her book reviews at www.reneeemerson.substack.com. 

Photography by Serjan Midili