A Piece I Started at the Shrine Thursday Night but Didn't Finish
Outside, Frank O'Reilly tells a crowd of a hundred and fifty people the story of the las days if stonewall Jackson. He doesn't normally need amplification, but tonight a pair of speakers casts his voice down the gentle slope, filled with visitors, toward the railroad tracks.
I'm upstairs in the Jackson Shrine, "upstage" of frank and behind him, so I can't hear him too well, especially with the sounds of footsteps clunking around downstairs from my colleagues who are trying to be quiet on a hardwood floor that doesn't tolerate silence. Frank is a wonderful storyteller--one of things I love about him the most--so I'm sure he's holding the visitors spellbound.
While I'm not privy to that part of tonight's program, I am experiencing tonight's candlelight vigil in a way just as meaningful to me. As the program unfolds outside, I'm one of five folks stationed inside the Shrine to babysit the lit candles that flicker in the windows. As the sole person stationed upstairs, I have the perfect vantage point to watch the sun set. The window glass, imperfectly made, has waves and ripples baked into it, making the orange light of the sunset shimmer as it spills into the room. The candle makes the air shimmer, too, with its single column of heated air rising past the panes. I shift my perspective slightly so that the sun sets over the candle, the flame inside lost against the backdrop of the larger one beyond.
But now the sun has gone, leaving behind only milky orange glow in the sky. The candle continues to burn, the flame's inexorable march down the wick melting itself away as it goes. It's light seems all the braver for being so finite against the gloaming.
I notice a doppelgänger flame reflected in the widow that looks even lonelier.
I have spent many, many hours in this building....
I'm upstairs in the Jackson Shrine, "upstage" of frank and behind him, so I can't hear him too well, especially with the sounds of footsteps clunking around downstairs from my colleagues who are trying to be quiet on a hardwood floor that doesn't tolerate silence. Frank is a wonderful storyteller--one of things I love about him the most--so I'm sure he's holding the visitors spellbound.
While I'm not privy to that part of tonight's program, I am experiencing tonight's candlelight vigil in a way just as meaningful to me. As the program unfolds outside, I'm one of five folks stationed inside the Shrine to babysit the lit candles that flicker in the windows. As the sole person stationed upstairs, I have the perfect vantage point to watch the sun set. The window glass, imperfectly made, has waves and ripples baked into it, making the orange light of the sunset shimmer as it spills into the room. The candle makes the air shimmer, too, with its single column of heated air rising past the panes. I shift my perspective slightly so that the sun sets over the candle, the flame inside lost against the backdrop of the larger one beyond.
But now the sun has gone, leaving behind only milky orange glow in the sky. The candle continues to burn, the flame's inexorable march down the wick melting itself away as it goes. It's light seems all the braver for being so finite against the gloaming.
I notice a doppelgänger flame reflected in the widow that looks even lonelier.
I have spent many, many hours in this building....