Poem

AUREOLE

The child removes the brass plate,
the harness around her ears.
The play is done. Her part,
scribbles on index cards, scattered
on the wooden, back stage floor.
Round makeup mirrors
with their white bulbs,
halo after halo, blowing out.

Circlet of gold, thousand-petaled
lotus at the head, light rounding
the dark curls of the sage
who rolls her lips and tongue
into the trees.

Despite the sheet, the plastic amulet,
she did feel something surge up
playing Aura of Rome—
through femur, belly and skull.
Will she know? Whether legend,
earth aspiring, tug of sun—
these magnets of heaven.

Valerie Martinez, from World to World, University of Arizona Press, 2004.