In school the nuns taught us 

the colors of church vestments-- 

white for purity and feast days, 

red for martyrdom, and green 

 

for hope and for “ordinary time,” 

the liturgical season when nothing  

happens: Christmas has disappeared 

in a snowy flash, and bells have tolled  

the lily-white petals of Easter, now silent,  

 

the dull stretch of days ahead 

meant to be merely ordinary, 

the quotidian boredom of stasis 

after a purpled Lent, with hope hanging 

on a blade of grass as the days wear on. 

 

A verdant spring becomes summer’s drought 

before the violet of Advent’s wilderness  

arrives once again to glitter us  

into stable and bright star.