610 - Matrilineage

Matrilineage
By Kathy Coffey

Before the cross slit
the sky of Chartres
before the stone sign
anchored Celtic graves
or a thumb with oil
printed a Roman forehead

Blandita the slave girl
hung on a post, morsel
for wild animals and
sport to entertain Lyon.
As fangs gnawed bone,
she hung in form of cross.

Her agony stirred memory
and other martyrs read
in her his ransom: again
torn flesh, convulsion,
scandal, the bleary eyes
as love keeps watch.

And still we read you,
Maura, Ita, Dorothy, Jean,
Elba and Celina Ramos,
sisters in Liberia: your
limbs stretched to impossible
contours of crucifix.

A frequent contributor to  THEOLOGY TODAY, Kathy Coffey teaches English at the University of Colorado, Denver, and at Regis College. Her work has also appeared in America, Spiritual Life, National Catholic Reporter, and the Christian Century.