Meditations in Barahona

The frame may be tarnished;

But the mirror stayed polished.

Sheila stood like a wind-wrung tree.

Life's not easy with age, nor more refined.

She held on to faith and clung to the Vine.

Her voice, like a deceptive breeze,

Calmed souls with fresh, morning air,

Then stirred them up with cloudbursts of prayer.

Her words, like the persistent sea, 

Smoothed jagged hearts with free-flowing ease.

Even Peron's tall boys had no force

To match the twinkle of her eyes.

Sheila once sat in an airport with boxes of Books

Her beloved Guardian had told her to take...

Her orders came from the Commander-in Chief,

So, what could she do but sit and wait?

As hours passed, her whimpering gaze

Melted the steel hearts of the Argentine guards,

Who ordered her through Books and all.

When fate is divine, who can escape?

Sheila found her home on the Española coast,

Island of the "black republics" divinely blessed;

Which the Master's Plan had "especially" stressed.

She built her refuge near the palace gates.

Under siege, her battles waged on canvas--

Splashes of sea and sand; landscapes of struggles

In the faces of the men. She taught UN troops

About the Source of all answers, 

The Maker of all questions.

Sheila was "dry in the sea."

"Don't think that a person becomes wise

With age," she advised. 

"Wisdom comes through prayer."

Rays of sunlight split the clouds

And appeared in her face.

Her eyes reflected peace;

I detected that her pleas

About life's "why's" had all been satisfied,

Except why the heroines had to wither away

Like dried up prunes,

As bed-ridden invalids devoid of speech.

Caswell, Warde and Agnes among them.

She didn't want to go like that.

"One hour's reflection is worth

Seventy years of pious worship..."

A tradition goes.

Then who knows

What seventy years of reflection

And service is worth.?

                                                                        -- C. S. Cholas

                                                            Dedicated to Sheila Rice-Wray,

                                                            Barahona Bahá'í winter school, 1983