AMAZING GRACE
From my desk I can see the Methodist Church
opposite, built during the first quarter
of the last century entirely by subscription,
with its decorative buttresses, Welsh slate roof
and faux Romanesque leaded windows.
If the doors are open and the wind is right
I can hear opening chords on the organ
and ‘How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.’
I watch the congregation age and the hearse
draw up – modest folk, worthily dressed,
not averse to jumble sales and laughter.
When the sky is cloudless and the sun is setting
over Liverpool Bay the rays shine through
one set of windows, the body of the church,
another set and illuminate
me – for half a minute – ‘…but now am found,
was blind, but now I see.’
