by Cathy Hailey
Ascent and descent
Symmetrical staircases
Move candlelight bent
Flames flicker faces
Pathways towards transcendency
Spirits drifting in
Liminality
A presidential burden
Despite empathy
Comforts multitudes
In national eulogy
Church bell interludes
Ritual “Amazing Grace”
All, Requiescat en Pace
Cathy Hailey teaches as an adjunct in Johns Hopkins University’s online MA in Teaching Writing program and previously taught high school English and Creative Writing in Prince William County, VA. She is northern region vice president of The Poetry Society of Virginia and organizes In the Company of Laureates, a biennial reading of poets laureate held in PWC. Her writing has been published in Poetry Virginia, The Journal of the Virginia Writing Project, Written in Arlington, The Prince William Poetry Review, Grid Poems, and in anthologies associated with ekphrastic collaborations.