SAINT PATRICK

In his confessions
he records his suffering
from sleep paralysis, the sun
like some pagan tempter, shining down
through his locked down eyelids, him there thinking
it was some fault of his, some unknown sin
that stretched him out as motionless as some
Celtic cross, or shadow of a cross,
heavy on the grass, while all around him,
a soft wind whispered through the trees,
the birds kept singing.