Sonnet for Newman
Below the crown of splitting earth and man
Are birds and wont, reprieve, a mortal breath
Entombed behind a wall that silence willed,
A refuge from the mouths enraged ahead.
Who shelters with my bones this purple eve
And knows the tide of shame that comes as friend?
The sin response befell in wordless dark
Upon the marble floor, a manse to cleanse.
Approach the flame, you hear its ochre bleat
And smell the sulfur blood within her veins.
Salvation is the conscience freely bled
Without inquired as to its ends or means.
To life prolong, transmit her that reprise,
Consume the price, a page, and soul maligned.
Eamonn McCarthy is a native of Delaware County, Pennsylvania and a recent graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied Biology and French. He currently studies medicine at Sidney Kimmel Medical College in Philadelphia.
