THE CRUTCHES AT LOURDES
They came here two by two, carrying their pilgrim
between them, asking one another in snide whispers
ahead and behind the foot, "Where does he think he's going?"
or, "How quickly she moves today, as if she didn't need us."
Left standing by the thousand now in the cool of the grotto,
they remember how ungratefully the lame heaved them here,
how thankless the miraculously cured were towards they
who carried them miles and years and never once complained
about being stuffed in an armpit all their lives. The canes
are even more morose: they have no companion to keep them
company when night falls and the healed have gone off weeping
under their own power. The only way these crutches stand
a chance to walk again is if a pilgrim who comes here is
not only not healed, but suffers more and more the lower
he lowers himself into the waters his daughters
claimed would cure him, so that he goes from merely
crippled to totally lame and, to go home, has to take up a pair
of crutches and leave behind his beloved swan-head cane.
They came here two by two, carrying their pilgrim
between them, asking one another in snide whispers
ahead and behind the foot, "Where does he think he's going?"
or, "How quickly she moves today, as if she didn't need us."
Left standing by the thousand now in the cool of the grotto,
they remember how ungratefully the lame heaved them here,
how thankless the miraculously cured were towards they
who carried them miles and years and never once complained
about being stuffed in an armpit all their lives. The canes
are even more morose: they have no companion to keep them
company when night falls and the healed have gone off weeping
under their own power. The only way these crutches stand
a chance to walk again is if a pilgrim who comes here is
not only not healed, but suffers more and more the lower
he lowers himself into the waters his daughters
claimed would cure him, so that he goes from merely
crippled to totally lame and, to go home, has to take up a pair
of crutches and leave behind his beloved swan-head cane.