—after Ron Hansen’s Mariette in Ecstasy
I. “She haunts her milk-white skin with her hands”
This morning is like any other—
sun through high windows, slow
rise toward breakfast and dressing.
But today is the day her life
begins. By afternoon, she’ll be
dressed in a wool habit, deep
into vows and sacrifice. For
now, though, she is alone
in her thoughts, stripped
naked in front of her long
mirror, memorizing exactly who
she is at this precipice, what
of her body is a gift she offers
the Lord. Unblemished skin,
unexplored, clean and ready for
cloister and prayer, labor and
blessing. She is bare in this morning
light, like a freshly cleared
table ready for setting, or some empty
book waiting for a dusting of ink.
II. “Were you happy with so much attention?”
What she hoped would be quiet,
reverent contemplation became
a celebration of her. Wedding dress, childhood
friends and neighbors, even horses
in procession like a carnival of
sacrifice, all carried her to church.
Countless hands found her skin hoping
to pull away a little grace for
themselves. Kisses, well-wishes, a joyous
chorus of goodbyes carting her
from her comfortable childhood
into the cold austerity of worship,
of devotion and marriage to her Christ,
to the absolute certainty of early
mornings, of house and field work, the joys
of sunlight and sorrow. How could she
have known what emptiness would be like,
or how strong the urge to fill it with
grace would be? How could she have imagined
how loneliness would caress her?
III. “And we know from our experience that extreme bliss can only come from extreme passion.”
She pours herself into chores like she knows
His voice will only come to her in moments
when floorboards are the most difficult to scrub,
when every muscle in her arms aches
from devotion. That pain is the flat tax she pays
for bliss, the seconds of losing herself,
her body, into the chasm of holiness that calls
for her prayers. In these moments, her
reflection disappears from the shine she has
coaxed from the slats of wood beneath
her knees. Her hands float away like the priest’s
do at Mass, and what she knows of her
body retreats into the recesses of her habit
like an ant into ground. Swoon. Ecstasy.
The throbbing silence of real communion.
How wonderful it would be to live in this
state, to spend every second enraptured like this.
She would not need food or sleep to stay
strong for these moments of bliss. Only heart,
and focus, and acceptance. And pain.
IV. “Oh, look at what Jesus has done to me!”
Her wounds are doorways to a place no one else
can go. Not as liminal as Christ’s, but
bleeding nonetheless, and wide open for all
to see. Both palms, her rib cage,
both feet. Then there is the blood, her
blood pouring out. The question, though,
remains: is it, any of it, for us? Or is her pain
just pain? Not for us, or her, or
the Lord. We can put our fingers
into the gash on her side. We can peer
through the holes in her hands and feet.
Doubt is not what plagues us. Belief
comes easy when blood pools around
her skirt. The moral of her suffering,
the reason she bleeds, that’s what the Church
needs to know, what we all wonder.
Does she deserve any of it? The pain.
The grace. The attention. The communion
she so clearly enjoys with the mysteries
haunting every one of our prayers.
V. “Evil spirits have been assailing her, or so she says”
It always starts with an open door
and the sense that all air has left
her chamber. Then covers and bed clothes
pushed aside, knees and soul
wrenched apart. Compliance earns her
nothing. Struggle or limp
surrender, the same. And it makes no matter
how many of the other girls
hear the violence knocking around
her room, or feel her body slam
against the damp priory walls. It continues
until it doesn’t. Every night, stormy
or clear-skied, frigid or seething outside.
But these assaults hurt her far less
than the whispers behind her in the hall,
the doubt floating all around her
at Mass or during chores. To those wraths
her wounds are just vanity, or a selfish cry
for attention. Her blood, some kind of con
she designed to mock their jealousy.
VI. “I tidy the house and tend the garden and have dinner with the radio on.”
And then, just like that, she is sent home,
not because the Church finds her
uncredible, but because they know she has
truly suffered, because they have
felt inside her wounds and cleaned her blood
from floorboards in almost every room
of the priory. No one who was there will ever
forget the perfume of it, how everything
she touched received a blessing. Silverware,
blankets, the books she studied,
the quill she used to write her confessions
to Fr. Marriott—all endowed with her
spirit. Still. But now she has been returned
to an ordinary life of making soup
and tea for her father each afternoon.
She busies herself keeping house
with the same devotion they called selfishness
inside. She prays with the same passion
as always, forever hoping to feel the Lord’s
touch one last time. Aching for it.
Jack B. Bedell is Professor of English and Coordinator of Creative Writing at Southeastern Louisiana University where he also edits Louisiana Literature and directs the Louisiana Literature Press. Jack’s work has appeared in HAD, Heavy Feather, Hawkeye, The Shore, Moist, Psaltery & Lyre, Dirtbag, Some Words and other journals. His work has also been selected for inclusion in Best Microfiction and Best Spiritual Literature. His latest collection is Fight Nights (Blue Horse Press, 2025). He served as Louisiana Poet Laureate 2017-2019.
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