Romanesque Arches

(Interior of St. Sernin’s - found here)

Tourists have crowded into the half-dark of the enormous

      Romanesque church.

Vault opening behind vault and no perspective.

A few candle flames flickered.

An angel whose face I couldn’t see embraced me

and his whisper went all through my body:

“Don’t be ashamed to be a human being; be proud!

Inside you one vault after another opens endlessly.

You’ll never be complete, and that’s as it should be.”

Tears blinded me

as we were herded out into the fiercely sunlit piazza,

together with Mr. and Mrs. Jones, Herr Tanaka and Signora

      Sabatini;

within each of them vault after vault opened endlessly.

~Tomas Tranströmer