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We were so small,
standing by the silver globe
out in Queens,
both of us glazed with rain
and a little dazed
by the thick press of people
and the polyphony of voices
drumming against our brains.
We have just seen the Pietà,
flown in specially from Rome
seven years before a crazed
man wielding a hammer
ensured it would never
leave an acrylic cage again.
I remember the marble
lit against blue velvet,
the gleam of light on stone,
the mother cradling her son
her eyes seeing only him,
his seeing nothing at all.
The art didn’t impress us
as much as the sidewalk
moving us along
like something
from Tomorrowland,
its processional pace
ensuring we could not linger long
in that glowing, speechless grief.

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Preparations for the conclave to find a new pope accelerated Friday with the installation of the chimney out of the Sistine Chapel that will signal the election of a successor to Pope Francis.
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