November 24, 2025
we are both young in this photo, with willful faces staring into the camera inside the old church. had we been praying, lost in reverie before the shutter closed and captured us as we were on that chilly day in october?
we kissed in the pews, chaste of course and held hands amongst dusty prayer books while the gleaming monstrance and sad-eyed jesus watched.
the old wood is damp and so is the carpet and the air is resplendent in petrichor and the wretched sweetness of decay coming through the floorboards. ive sang in this place gently offering the lonely words of ‘wayfaring stranger’ to the old chapel.
i took a girl here once because i had a crush on her and i thought she was beautiful in the same broken way that i admire in people – the same way i admire it in myself, too.
it’s in him, too, you know? the pain he carries inside that viking blood of his is the same pain that i carry inside me. i feel his pain as he feels mine.
we are young in this photo, and we are beautiful, too. i hope one day that someone somewhere finds this photo of us together, maybe some grainy crusty .jpg on an internet archive of tumblr posts or maybe tucked between the pages of a book about alchemy or martyrs or birds. i hope they wonder about us. i hope someone makes up a story about us and i hope they can feel the old chapel and our pain and our beauty and the way that something bigger than us was in that room with us.
i hope they think i had a really cool jacket.
~
photo by scott floronic
taken at the historic o’keefe ranch
october 2025
It was thirty days til Easter when the elm tree hit the church
Thank God it fell on Friday cause at least no one was hurt
But there was fear it might delay the second coming of the lord
Cause the stained glass crucifixion was in stains upon the floor
They spent a day of cleaning and a day to board the hole
Where the stained glass once had cast a godly light upon the fold
But come the Sunday service all the faces now were gray
And they commenced to take donations as the faithful knelt to pray
But on Monday they discovered that the man who’d built the glass
Was the only man in town who could and sadly he had passed
But his father who was ninety said the tools were in the shed
And he’d kindly try and resurrect the window from the dead
The congregation argued, but the wise ones all rejoiced
In the one hand was solution, in the other was no choice
And they gave the man their blessings and they gave his hand a shake
And they gave him all the coins they had collected on their plate
It was seven days til Easter and they’d seen a hide nor hair
So they came and knocked at suppertime in hopes the man was there
But a banging from the basement was ‘bout all that they could hear
And curses that might make the devil blush and wash his ears
Come first thing easter morning and to everyone’s good grace
The man was up on ladders with the window nailed in place
It was covered in black velvet like a hood or like a veil
He pulled the sheet and there it hung apocryphal and frail
The seams had melted jagged, they were crooked like a spine
The glass was rough like hands of man against the hands of time
And there was bloodstains in the red and there were teardrops in the blue
He said: It may not be the best but it’s the best that I can do
The chapel fell to silence, it was more than just surprise
As the monstrosity of color slid its tongue across their eyes
And they shivered from exposure like babies born again
Cause in every pane of glass was all the joy and pain of man . . .
There was every fearful smile, there was every joyful tear
There was each and every choice that leads from every there to here
There was every cosy stranger and every awkward friend
And there was every perfect night that’s left initials in the sand
There was every day that filled so full the weeks would float away
And there was all those days spent wondering what to do with all those days
There was every lie that ever saved the truth from being shamed
And every secret you could ever trust a friend to hide away
There was the fortune of discovering a new face you might adore
And the thrill of coming home to find her clothes upon the floor
And the prideful immortality of children in the home
That the storm can’t grind the mountain down, it can only shift the stones
And there was everything your mouth says that your lips don’t understand
And every shape inside your head you can’t carve with your hands
And every slice of glass revealed another slice of life
Emblazened imperfections in a perfect stream of light
It all flooded through the window like rapids made of fire
And then God rode through on sunshine and sat down cause he was tired
He was tired.
As the thunder and the hardwood settled back into its place
God removed his veil and there were scars across his face
And some folks prayed in reverence and some folks prayed in fear
As all the shades and chaos in the glass became a mirror
Danny Schmidt – “Stained Glass”
hospital vespers 