Recalled Sunlight

Morning found me exploring

around the old chapel again.

The walls, at least, started in the right spots,

though broken plaster had long since yielded

to insistent vines and wings claiming shelter.

Finding my favorite boulder,

I sat, and stretched,

drinking the water I pulled

from the well earlier in my pilgrimage.

It held up to my memory:

sweet and restorative after the journey made,

fortifying the spirit for what lay further ahead.

The sun dappled boulder was a more congenial spot

to enjoy my libations,

than the hard backed pews,

softened somewhat by the spread of moss.  

The water finished, I went around back,

to find the spot I enjoyed hiding in

when I was small.

A sea of violets greeted me,

more dazzling under the stream of sunlight,

than the cold glitter of the stained glass windows,

once whole in the crumbling walls,  

My sketchbook came out.

I lost myself in translating petals and leaves

into lines and letters

until the results pleased me.

Only afterwards, I noticed

that although I’d outgrown my hiding spot,

I still had my sweet tooth.

I gathered the violets for candying later.

They would delight my children as well as myself.

Perhaps I would tell them the stories

I found along the way.  

Song Choice: Pocket Full Of Sunshine by Natasha Bedingfield 

This poem was inspired by two prompts: A Dash of Sunny's Prompt Nights - A Drop of Sunshine and Imaginary Gardens With Real Toads - Tax Day (use words from T.S. Elliot's The Waste Land. I used violets, wings, well, chapel, memory, broken, and glitter).