Semana Santa

The purple and the green tapestries hang
from balconies all over Alhaurin;
from up at the Plaza Baja, to down
in the centre of town.

Valve-free trumpets brass off the neighbours
as the brotherhoods rehearse
and the town traffic succumbs
to a standstill for drums

along the high street. Smart dresses see the
light of day and neon-night-time
and back again. Rain falls
and plasters drapes to walls,

girls and boys shuffle, shoulders down,
to work on checkouts, bars
and building sites, glad rags
underneath - or in handbags.

Still, Thursday brings holy respite and
the celebration lasts the clock round
and round. Daytime for the sacred tunes
until they dance like disco loons

by the light of Dani or Pyramida and
three generations eat and drink
for the rest of the holiest week;
have liaisons that do not speak

so much of devoutness. But God is love,
loves a procession even in wet streets
and black-eyed girls can keep piety
cheek-by-jowl with impropriety.

And Monday comes - deathly still -
as though no resurrection happened;
so quiet - no muskets, drums, or horns -
on the pavement is a sodden crown of thorns.