THERESE

CLAIRE CRONIN

H – N G M – N d o t C O M

a H_NGM_N portable document format chapbook h-ngm-n.com/chaps Cover by Claire Cronin Interior & Packaging by Nate Pritts

I Therese was beautiful at seaside light blue ribbons in her hair Little Flower of the Divine Prisoner who cried for nothing then cried for having cried Her great capacity for sadness moved by military music from the academy next door Therese ate nights and rocks northern stars, glass, European monarchs Had nervous tremors lasting six weeks at a time Encouraged to renounce herself by cloisters overhead Therese dressed her dolls in Carmelite lace She stood with open palms a wind carrying salt The tremors were a blue thread through her life

II Somewhere in the background a small pattern of wolves hollowing the distance Therese wakes each day violetly crying in and out of speech Through cracks in crown glass enters fog Milk-dark filling up the space beneath Therese’s sleep

III Before she was a photograph Therese lived in a white dress like a lake Four seasons of small coffins her mother also gone her sisters who survived did so to enter holy orders Therese received the Scarlet Palm the Silver Palm at school was petted and adored for painting pictures The Little Queen a golden cloud of curls At Christmastime, her father placed milk chocolates in her satin shoes Such tenderness, this flood God grants me this Unspeakable sweetness

IV Therese believed the other girls did not think about death enough The body is a farmer The body is endlessly receiving its own shadow Like any girl, Therese’s heart a pear inside a bridal chest Much petted and adorned with pearls and ribbons feathers, miniature ships All terraced gardens blooming safely under gauze and sugar-held, the children’s perfumed hair The rural aristocracy believed the dead come back in well-adorned black carriages Therese wept when she noticed how the roses lose their color in the dark

V Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face fitful in her shadow built her silent house inside the convent at Lisieux The flowers that she gathered in the gardens matched her sacrifices made each day: twenty-eight on average After her death, the church received nine thousand, seven hundred, forty-one reports of roses sent by Therese to those who prayed to her for signs

VI Therese born to a ballroom filled with snow white dresses into which each girl would bloom What would become of their enchanting homes and gardens? Even their fragrant hair would blanch white as the wigs of the previous century

VII The chapel at Lisieux is waiting for a bell that angels are delivering from Nazareth Therese reads backwards, walks the halls wraps peonies beneath the gray sleeves of her habit Four seasons of small coffins her mother also gone and buried in a box built for a child The nuns have gathered roses and toss petals towards the faces of the statues It is true that there were days when Therese would not speak at all

VIII At first, God instructed her in secret: I go behind my bed to an empty space and enclose myself entirely with curtains

IX Therese began to suffer from the throat I want to live without speaking to myself as if the singing birds are errors This fog This darkness Therese’s body flecked in faint white O’s of weeping Headaches after midnight mass God’s open mouth found everywhere across her The purpose of affliction is to make yourself unrecognizable to yourself To suffer without effort or constraint Therese takes turpentine and salt red dust from the Colosseum floor God closes his blue eyes to me Therese’s I retreating

X Two themes were dear to her: A boat that hurries towards the light A singing bird that falls into a trance Seven hours kneeling, little bread Therese was less and less Once I was a braid kneeling before them glittering like pastries and cakes

XI One winter day What joy! Therese’s handkerchief filled with blood Whooping cough or nervous fits Nervous tremors lasting six weeks at a time The prioress reproached her for her hope of dying young To vanish as a glass poured into soil Therese painted a pink Jesus on the antechamber wall and gold trim on the robe of every statue She carved with a sharp tool into the lintel of her cell: No love in fear of water enter here

XII Many times, Therese held tight her right hand in her left when walking past a sister’s cell, she wished to knock She did not lean against a pillar or a wall She did not sit near fire, knowing how its heat would comfort her It took an effort to stand up and chant An hour, sometimes, to undress To pray well, I must give myself to suffering and song The face of the Child Jesus is a pointed arrow full of milk

XIII The fog came in through cracks and curtained her white bed Therese wrote slowly, letters curled wide spaces between lines: If I go to heaven soon lightly colored red and gold In heaven, where I will not rest but work — I’ll ask permission of the Lord to visit you next Christmas

XIV Therese bed down inside the wound The next day brought more blood and speaking of Saint Augustine: Black Grief remade my heart

XV It was a song of joy that called her to her tomb To absent herself from Her snowy shoulders falling fog and fog Therese’s body, bell felted with dust