Communion: a love poem (a villanelle)
Make it more than bread and wine–
more than unleavened and red
–lace your heart into mine.
Let out the old bones and hem my spine
with yours instead.
Make it more than bread and wine.
My God, My God, tough as twine
woven over and over. With coarsest thread,
lace your heart into mine,
so what is broken may be mended by the divine,
until each word I say is one you’ve said.
Make it more than bread and wine.
Life sewn into life, stitch and seam refined
(in with the new, my old life’s shed)
lace your heart into mine.
I am the branches, you are the vine
I can laugh at the days ahead.
Oh, make it more than bread and wine:
lace your heart into mine.
Rachel Bollinger is an undergraduate student at Stephen F. Austin State University. She is a theatre education major but she has a passion for poetry. She’s a proud Austinite and follower of Christ.