Sunday Sonnet

IN VIA EST CISTERNA
by Mark Jarman


All she remembers from her Latin class
Is a phrase she echoes for her granddaughter.
Lately I hear in everything she says
A depth that she covers up with laughter.
In the road is a well. But in her mind
It fills with blanks, like a shaft of sand and pebbles.
A well is in the road. It is profound,
I'm sure, it is a phrase with many levels.
And then, I see one: the woman with five husbands
Met Jesus there. But my mother had only one --
Unless now having lost him she understands
That he was never who she thought, but someone
Who was different men with different women through the years.
In the road is a well. It fills with tears.





Sonnet courtesy of The Penguin Book of the Sonnet: 500 Years of a Classic Tradition in English and originally appeared in Jarman's Unholy Sonnets