The warm shadows, the dusty light–Holy.
The smell of horses, their flesh,
     their manure, the sweet hay–Grace.
Their soft nickering to one another–Song.

She gave chunks of apple to the horses
who lifted their heads to greet her,
stroked their whiskered muzzles, called
the names of the shy or cautious.

And her favorite, Greek, a gentle,
fine-boned bay gelding. In the purple
depths of his eyes, she found a solace
she did not know how to ask for.

She grieved her body, newly strange and urgent.
She grieved her home, its perilous silences.
And her faith, its desertion deepening until,
at Easter, she yearned for grace. And felt nothing.

Here, in the nimbus of dust motes,
the snuffling and shuffling of beautiful creatures,
she felt revealed to herself, again known
to what she once would have called God.

Mary Rohrer-Dann is author of Taking the Long Way Home (Kelsay Books, 2021). Additional work appears/forthcoming in The Clackamas Review, Keystone: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Stories, Vestal Review, Third Wednesday, Rat’s Ass Review. She lives in central PA, but is still a Philly girl at heart.