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64 Novena October 28th,the Feast of St.Jude Jude, we never imagined the color of hope to be hideous. One of us is wasting: she will eat nothing but dry green salads, green tea by the gallon. We have prayed to every other saint as she wastes. It is your turn, Jude. We kneel.We drag her in to burn votives and she’s so thin candlelight passes through her, making a shadow show of organs, her skeleton. For nine days, nine weeks, nine months, we kneel and nothing is born.We despair and kneel.We make plans for nine years and try to think green thoughts, Jude, though it is the end of October and autumn has burned through your color— we call up the green film of skin racked on her bones like scum on a pond, the hair falling from her comb, stringy as algae. We kneel and make promises.All night, Jude. We will drive all night and pay to light every candle at your shrine in Baltimore, we will donate everything to the hospital that bears your name if only—if only. We kneel and her teeth 65 crumble in her mouth.We smell the reek of vomit and rot on her breath, see the meat of her eyes gone green, and we kneel. ...

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