Lux In Tenebris

for Fr. R.S.

Surrounded, half by pavement half by sea,
I read whatever book it was I had
on hand, by streetlamp and the light of windows.

Could you believe that in a single day
I stood where Patrick Hamilton was burned
and later in the hermit’s cave who read

by light of his own illuminated hand?
There is another sort of martyrdom,
to be only text, a lexicon half shaded

by the reader. Light weighs on everything,
but never heavier than on a sunny day
turned night. One ship signaled and passed another.

—The Scores, St Andrews 2020