This is not time for transubstantiation.

That alchemy is left for wizards.

I know of wine & blood and lead & gold

and baser things besides.  They sit

like knick-knacks on my coffee table.

I am too fascinated by wands and canes,

cards, rings, golden cones, coloured balls,

the blur of the hierophants arms

in his many jagged manipulations,

and when a dove appears from darkness.

I stare at auroras awed,

let rhinestones glitter in my eyes.

‘Pizzazz’ to me is still a sacred word,

more holy than ‘Amen’, more sanctified than ‘Love’,

an ever-present credo of my youth.

It is the song of words that sparkles

more than the words themselves.

The magic dance, the play of light,

a language foreign to these green ears.

I hear but know I cannot understand.