the apprentices

RED
CASSOCKS

Red cassocks
For the Altar boys
At Mass on
Christmas Eve.

Red cassocks
For the Altar boys
For those who
Don’t believe.

Yet creep into
The church’s womb,
At Midnight Mass
Each year,

They crave the sight
A drop of bright
Bold red
To stop their fear.

And down the nave
The torches click,
And clack opaque
Red glass,

And that is so
Their senses know
To hear, smell, see
The Mass.

And then the
Elevation,
Transubstantiated
Bread,

Confessed-converts,
Scabbed souls with hurts,
Bleed white
By Crimson red.