Ellen Wright
ELLEN WRIGHT is the author of the poetry collection, Family Portrait with Oilwell (2023, Kelsay Books), and the chapbook, In Transit (2007, Main Street Rag). She has recent work in The Louisville Review, Naugatuck River Review, Willows Wept Review and The Fourth River, among others. Her master’s degree in comparative literature is from New York University. Born and raised in the greater Boston area, she makes her home in Brooklyn and her living as a musician.
RESURRECTION ANXIETY
In my zeal to evade
the bracing virtue of cold
by swaddling myself
in scarves and hoodies,
by squinting my eyes
shut against sleet,
and hunching my shoulders
against winter wind’s wallop,
I have reduced myself to nothing
but the reason why,
this year, spring
has been cancelled.
Here at the organ where
manufacturing alleluias is my job,
penalty-winter can’t touch me.
Ritual has taught me how
to be stoic. Secretly
scoffing what Resurrection
insulates me against my
performance of the Good News,
protects me from potted lilies
and painted eggs festooning
the day when Easter skids in
on a sheet of ice and grime.
But the music.
The sheer effort
of purveying joy
before we all shiver forth from
the church’s stage-lit glow
not thinking some buried sprout’s purple
could burst its own umbrage
at climate’s cold shoulder
and poke the curl of its tongue
out from exile—what if
it should shine, in spite of itself,
a flicker of defiance
at the punishment we have
all been avoiding? Should I
admit a glance? Could my throat
grudge a harrumph of sistership?
What would be the chance
of further reprisal
for joining the faithful
in the clamor their hymns?
For celebrating relief from
the blame I never
really conceded to suffer?
