THE MOVING STATUE

9 R T H E M O V I N G S T A T U E E A V A N B O L A N D Tended light lay every day that summer enveloping apple trees, bell-like fuschias, the low slope of an incline five miles south of Kinsale. Where in a tangle of spruce, pine, sycamore, beside a thick swivel of lilac and a sign pointing to Cork a statue of the Virgin stood back from a balustrade, the crown of her head haloed with small electric bulbs while blue concrete letters under her feet spelled out I am the Immaculate Conception. While the familiar news of guns in moonless darkness and snipers at dawn was upstaged by the story of a woman who stopped by a grotto in Ballinspittle and saw a statue move. It was a warm summer The days starved of rain Soon it would be harvest, time to save the hay, holiday makers watching 1 0 Y train windows filling with the crop laid in swatches, left to dry for hours as the light grew less. Meanwhile the Blessed Virgin in her accustomed place harvested the longing seen on warm evenings in every upturned face as the radio brought news of wonders and illusions: the Virgin’s hands unfolding, an entire statue rising an inch above its pedestal while a whole town abandoned its fields and supper tables, its nights of cow bingo, the roads clogged with cars. New visitors learning directions to the grotto: a countryside perfecting its discipline of yearning. Then the season changed. Upstairs in my room, the Dublin hills hidden, I took down my notebook – your eyes shall be opened – and left the page unwritten. Early twilights rested on the incline to the west. October dawns flamed: a sword in the east. By every news report the Virgin’s hands were still. No movement. Not a gesture. ...