First communion: 6

She sings hymns with words that are not her own. Nobody sings her words, not even herself— her hopeless desire for perfection: mute, her self-loathing, her suppressed hatred: mute. She cannot shake the vision that in heaven all is not right. Mary hunches over, old and feeble, nursing her torn womb. Jesus, having cured the lepers, had caught leprosy. All the saints are bleeding on the white marble.