The Altar Boy (Altare pueri)
Poem, Sonnet-like
Sister said, “I think, next year, you must repeat Geometry”,
Therefore I am, unworthy to receive You today, O Lord.
The devil’s son Descartes has declared a war against me,
And Discours is the name of that unholy bastard’s sword,
With which he disarmed Euclid, Diophantus, Archimedé’,
As Eris at Olympus with the Apple of Discord,
O!—
The minister warns the faithful a little before the Consecration with a ring of the small bell. (Ritus servandus in celebratione Missae, VIII, 6)
Father said, in homily, “beware of scrupulosity”,
Of sins imagined merely or of faults of no accord.
Therefore!—