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The Country Church

Phillip A. Ellis

The track, which was dirt, damped down
by faith in something other
than the clear skies of summer,
and the three pines that barely
cleared the roof, had led to church.

We’d go each Sunday we’re there
with dad, as he built the farm,
and after he moved in, sun
clearing through panes of clear glass,
some coloured, from memory.

The hymns were long familiar
by the time I had clearly
forgotten the church, from long
exposure elsewhere, but yet
they were new here, unexplored.

The wooden walls, and the lack
of ventilation trapped us
into such an atmosphere
of stifling heat, somnolence,
the voice a chant and burden.

That was then. This is now, time
having passed as time always
does. I went back, a short time
ago, and passed the church. I
felt that I had never strayed.

The track’s still dirt. The pines have
shrunk, somewhat, the church is still,
if somewhat greyer. The sky
is still an unmarked hue. I
feel that I had never strayed.

I did not enter in. Time’s
mysteries remain unmarred.
I had not gone on Sunday,
preferring my profane rest,
my atheism secure.

And, looking down from the farm
towards the tin roof, burnished,
brightly metallic under
the sunlight, I felt the heat,
heard the buzzing of the flies.

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