After Leaving the Sanctuary
By Veronica Tucker
The hymns followed me home,
even after I folded the book
and walked out for the last time.
In the grocery store aisle,
a chorus rode the hum of the freezers.
Psalms slid into my dreams,
their words dressed in the voice of my mother.
I learned silence first,
to let the air replace ritual.
Then came the slow undoing,
peeling stained glass from my ribs,
scrubbing incense from my lungs.
Now the quiet is not absence.
It is soil.
It is a chance to grow a new language
with my children’s laughter at the roots.
Veronica Tucker (she/her) is an emergency medicine and addiction medicine physician, married mother of three, and lifelong New Englander. Her poetry explores the intersections of medicine, motherhood, memory, and being human. Her work appears in One Art, Eunoia Review, Berlin Literary Review, and The Book of Jobs anthology. When she isn’t writing or working in the hospital, she enjoys running, travel, time with family, and finely crafted matcha lattes. Find her at veronicatuckerwrites.com and on Instagram @veronicatuckerwrites.
Artwork Source: Textile sample by unknown designer; manufactured by J. Claude Frères & Co. In the public domain.
The Turning Leaf Journal 