A Winter Sunday Morning,1965 Poem by Margaret O Driscoll

Sunday morning, our parish church bell rings for mass
Entering the church men take off their flat caps
Parishioners genuflect before sitting down in their usual places
A woman click clacks her way to a front pew - then, a sacred hush

Two altar boys dressed in long white robes light altar candles
I adjust a hairclip that holds my mantilla in place
Our priest, in lace-trimmed vestments, holds a red missal
An altar boy rings a bell -the congregation kneel - mass starts

All mass prayers in Latin back then - sounding resonant, soothing, melodic
My attention is drawn to a woman's collar right in front of me
Adorned with a sleek pair of stuffed mink, their claws seem to clutch her shoulders
My gaze fixed on their beady eyes, though their limp bodies seem asleep

Kyrie Eleison - Christie Eilison -chants that stay in my memory
An ornate white cloth is carefully draped over wooden rails
Parishioners kneel there in reverence as they receive Communion
At collection time the altar boys holding long-handled money bags proceed along pews, half crowns and coppers clinking

When mass ends, the altar boys snuff out the bright candles
We bless ourselves at the holy water font by the church door
A local shop is open after mass for customers to get Sunday newspapers
Breakfast is a big fry-up, sizzling sausages, rashers, eggs fried in bacon fat
On radio news I hear that mass will soon be heard here in the vernacular for the first time