MAURA h. hARRISON

Maura H. Harrison is a photographer, graphic designer, and poet. She is currently a student in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at the University of St. Thomas, Houston. She lives in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

Marianne Stokes’ “St. Elizabeth of Hungary Working for the Poor”

When Marianne began to paint, she found

me sewing clothes in crisp and clearing light.

She knew my eyes were tired, all watered down

with blurring tears, two seas of mourning sight.

And now it’s months since Ludwig’s death, and still

My sight is tossed about and stitches drip:

The wandering threads of white get lost, they spill

Into the folds, more white, a swimming slip

Into the linen on my lap. My stitch —

A pierce and then a pull — moves prayer across

My heart and tacks the pain in place, a niche

For sacrifice where I can love my loss.

Her title says I’m working for the poor:

But I am thinking of a humble bread,

Hidden and cloaked, of roses red, of more

insight on how to ply my prayerful thread.

Read Maura’s work and view her visual art in Solum Journal Fall 2022.