To Each Her Saint – a poem by Carolyn Martin

To Each Her Saint

Canonize? The prize
for two miracles.
Not much to ask,
considering.
Someone walks upright,
banishes unruly cells,
faces off
the voices in her head,
stops a river’s rise:
triumphs claimed
in an almost-saint’s name.

For those of us
who dismiss titles
and candles lit
on flowered altars
in a namesake church,
we elect
to venerate a dad
stacking barrels
of paint for years
on the merciless concrete
of a factory floor.

Carolyn Martin is blissfully retired in Clackamas, OR, where she gardens, writes, and plays with creative friends. Her poems appear in publications throughout North America and the UK and her fourth poetry collection, A Penchant for Masquerades, will be released by Unsolicited Press in 2019. She serves as poetry editor of Kosmos Quarterly.