prayer

The woman in the
red
Land Cruiser drives
with a rosary
hanging from the rear-view mirror,
Many do,
here. Even those
in the BMWs and
Jaguars.
The rosaries sway
and its beads rattle,
bumping into one another,
gently,
quietly.
My mother
never hung a
rosary, that I can
remember.
She gripped
it, instead, tightly, deathly tight,
especially at night, when no one else
was up,
when she prayed, often moments before dawn,
for more
penances, more chance to prove
her
heavenly worth. That’s
what she believed in:
punishment.
She
drove
an ’83
LeBaron.