Mrs. Patterson Stopped Attending

Lyrics

The bell has a different sound today. Thinner.
It doesn't call anyone in from the wind.
It just marks the time. Ten o'clock on a Sunday.

The first Sunday was a question.
A missed step on a familiar stair.
Reverend Goss adjusted his stole, looked toward the door,
then at the second pew on the right.
At the green cushion, plump and un-dented. Perfectly aligned.
He cleared his throat.
He waited a beat longer than the liturgy requires, a small pocket of silence.
Then he began the reading, his voice aimed at the space where she wasn't.

And the sermon for one empty seat
Echoes off the damp stone.
Reverend Goss preaches to the salt air and the silence.
And my own voice grows quieter,
Trying not to disturb the shape of her absence.

The second Sunday was a statement.
The question had been answered by the quiet.
The twins don't ask. They just look, then down at their hands.
I watch them trace the grain on the pew in front of them.
The hymnals in her spot gather a fine dust I can see in the light from the high window.
The Reverend doesn't pause this time.
He just preaches to the three of us. A little softer.

And the sermon for one empty seat
Echoes off the damp stone.
Reverend Goss preaches to the salt air and the silence.
And my own voice grows quieter,
Trying not to disturb the shape of her absence.

The third Sunday is something else.
Not a question, not a statement. It's become a vigil.
We are not performing for an audience that isn't there.
The words are for the walls, for the brass cross, for the memory of a congregation.
His voice isn't for her anymore, or for us.
It's for the thing itself. An engine running in an empty room.
The candle flickers. The wind answers the Amens.

Three weeks.
The green cushion holds its shape, waiting.
The pew is no longer empty.
It is occupied by a profound quiet.
A presence, not an absence.