A Hard Bargain

If you are young and say your prayers
before a statue of the Virgin Mary,
pick it up and peep underneath.
For, when I was young, I did,
and found a ten shilling note.
Then curious as a new born lamb
and forgetting my prayers completely,
and dashing into the next room
I turned St. Anthony on his side
and found another ten shilling note.
Then in my excitement and in my pyjamas
and finding no more statues,
I leapt down the stairs wild with excitement
until, hushed, and shushed, and turned around,
I was hurried and scurried up the stairs to bed.
Where, with the door closed,
my old aunt Kathleen told me her secret.

She had a line to Heaven,
to the angels and saints,
to the Virgin and St. Anthony,
and she was driving a bargain.
As soon as they had done
(whatever it was)
she wanted them to do,
this money would go
to the good causes that she knew
the Virgin and St. Anthony would approve of.

So I went to sleep happy,
knowing that Heaven was a friendly place;
and pleased that I had discovered a grown up's secret.

But when I grew up, I started to worry.

Why were there two lots of money
to different saints,
if one saint is as good as another?

And oh dear! was it possible
that my simple old aunt
was not so simple after all,
but making mischief in Heaven,
turning angels and saints
one against the other
and in the same good cause?

I think not!
Which is why I am telling you.

for I am sure
that when my old aunt Kathleen
went to Heaven,
she still had,
secrets,
of her own,
which she packed for the journey.

_________

© Cormac McCloskey

As this poem is to be enjoyed by children, (which is not to exclude adults), some of the more obscure words have been removed. The phrasing and punctuation have also been changed. Cormac, 17th February 2011