On Fire a story from the Fioretti Saint Clare insisted on a meal with him. She stared beyond him, fingered her coarse sleeve and asked again – would not be denied that bread. When at last he heard her longing, he planned, for her delight, a lunch al fresco beside her heart’s home: Saint Mary of the Angels – where she had been shorn. That day, Clare hastened beyond San Damiano’s walls to sit in sunshine on the bare ground where Francis served the first dish. They started talking. And their talk was sweet – a cordial so inspiriting for two fervent souls that from far away people saw the church on fire. With buckets and cries – sure the church and woods and convent were all destroyed – crowds burst through the gate to quench flames but found only two friends picnicking with Love, their refiner.
Mia Schilling Grogan is an Associate Professor of English at Chestnut Hill College in Philadelphia. She is a medievalist, who publishes in the areas of hagiography and women’s spiritual writing. Her poems have appeared in America, Presence, First Things, The Windhover, and Ekstasis among other journals.
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