The warmth
of a late summer Dublin evening
reaches across acres of Georgian chimneypots
and
flows
through two vast rectangles of
light
as I sit in the room
in which a woman died
over one hundred and fifty years ago.
I am awed at the mystery of her calling,
the grace which grew in her.
What is she to me
and I to her?
She is present but elusive:
I know her and do not know her.
She leaves broad brush strokes
not minute disclosures,
her person less discernible than her spirit
and her purpose.
Not for our times, not for words, so much of
who this Catherine was, it seems.
I ask for some glimmer of knowing,
some small window on her spirit,
a blessing as I sit here,
of kinship and connection,
of mentor and sister-guide,
of bonds across time,
a mercy shared.
