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ST JOAN The great actress Renée Jeanne Falconetti stands trial for heresy, a woeful story told with her eyes and their shadows, deep ponds of grey long-written about Carl Theodor Dreyer’s La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc was filmed in 1928 Falconetti’s Joan wobbles between the fortitude of her beliefs and the struggle of her impertinence Poor girl soldier Down some wild time tunnel that unfurls to reconnect us, it’s 1431 She’s nineteen years old  The judges at her trial are glib and rotund, spoils of screaming meat robed and hooded, their spittle landing on her cheek in sharp whips   FRAGMENTS The iconography of the Catholic Church calls to me on every damned vacation I can remember taking I can’t resist visiting ornately carved altars where tokens of grotesque and antiquated clues to faith, and to the unravelling of faith, are tucked away Teeth, bone fragments, hair, splinters and textiles Burned, flooded, bloodied, treasured Put them together and an odiferous lair of mystical toxicity could sink a parallel world Where does the pain go that pulls people apart, bloodying them, setting them on fire, yanking out teeth?   On a bookshelf in my living room, there is a ceramic Noah’s Ark container that fits in my palm The bottom half is the boat, and its lid is decorated with sculpted giraffes and elephants, desperate for their storied escape, but smiling their animal smiles all the same Inside, I’ve stowed my son’s baby teeth, one by one, after pilfering them from his letters to the tooth fairy It’s only after they’ve all fallen out that I learn their synonyms: ‘milk teeth’ and ‘deciduous teeth’ Milk teeth have filament-thin roots; not strong enough to grow a whole life, but useful nonetheless Deciduous trees shed their leaves annually, signalled by the changing seasons We are all subject to this flying planetary axis, taking this wild ride, shedding our milk teeth for some greater cause   JONI When all the single mothers of my childhood gathered over the cauldron of the CrockPot potlucks, they listened to Joni Mitchell The album cover was beige and austere, with five words written in cursive: Court and Spark/Joni Mitchell