Saint Monica by Mary Biddinger

"Saint Monica Burns It Down" originally appeared in the Valparaiso Literary Review and is forthcoming in Biddinger's soon-to-be-released chapbook, Saint Monica.

I must admit: I love this poem. I'm such a fan of poets adapting, revising, and rediscovering saints, and who deserves this attention more than St. Monica?

Biddinger brings Monica to the present; to the present Midwest, to the life of a young woman now. Such fantastic images here: "a warm Budweiser in each pocket," two terriers "holed up / in ruts beneath the shed," "reflections / of his white undershirt illuminating / the window frame."

Although we are grounded and directed by Monica through the title, no specific names appear in the actual text. We move with the narrative, one guided by a relationship between "her" and "he." We know from the first lines that she's ready for action--revenge, perhaps, thought it's all offered here with a light-hearted tinge. This feels like a poem about adultery--or at least the whiffs of infidelity. We have the late-night leaving, the returning in attempted silence, the "other woman."

I like that the poem ends with her, appropriately in front of "a gas stove." The layers here are clever, I think (burned in/by love). It's a smart, sly poem, one that breathes a new life into Monica--what's amazing is that Monica isn't very active in the poem, but so perceptive (she hears, she plans, she wonders). I like that this project isn't allegorical--Monica is memory, she is/was bigger than life, and these poems can inhabit, play with that persona but can move elsewhere, places new and fresh.

*

Mary was kind enough to share an advanced copy of Saint Monica with me, and it becomes obvious that such a figure as Monica--even redefined and recasted--is worthy of more than just a singular poem.

The chapbook contains 18 Saint Monica poems, with the aforementioned piece arriving at number 15. Biddinger begins the chapbook with a brief historical note adapted from Patron Saints Online. What's interesting about the note is the focus on Monica's prior struggles (alcoholism), her lifelong desires and attempts to convert her family, and the fact that her son Augustine's writings are our prime source of information about her. The latter immediately creates a mythos for her: she longed for her son's conversion, and he was no ordinary Catholic: his Confessions are the silent words of the box spoken for all readers, and his sins are revealed, not the least of which is his earlier rejection of his mother.

Can we find the real Saint Monica? I'm not sure, which makes her such a malleable and appropriate persona for these poems.

"Saint Monica Stays the Course" is an early prose poem from the collection (the chapbook includes both lineated and prose forms). It's a beautiful piece that begins with the sentence:

"One year at Saint Joseph, the girls who had first names beginning with M were invited to walk in the May Crowning procession."

And, at any such event, the following is bound to happen:

"Sister Cathleen instructed the girls in the correct way to proceed."

Monica is part of this procession, and though the poem includes the practical instructions one would expect (look straight, not into the pews; do not become nervous and sick; clasp "your bunch of daffodils"), it is augmented by the imagined, yet probable later instructions of these young women as adults. The poem riffs on these, and some are hilarious, others are a bit more troubling, and though the piece doesn't necessarily try to do so, it opens up thought about the less than wonderful opportunities for women in the Church.

Monica exists in this poem and the others in the sequence without the "Saint" (at least in the body of the poems), and such omission is no sacrilege. Sainthood is a way of living; saint is a title. You don't need the latter, and how many have we experienced who could never achieve the popularity necessary for consideration?

Monica is a real person in this chapbook, and "Saint Monica and the Hate" is an example of how she's not only the target of gossip, but equal parts hate and reverence:

All parents loved her, dropped
her name when scolding about tangled hair,
crooked hems. No wonder her girlfriends
stabbed her in the back with knives, forks,
hairpins, chopsticks, whatever was handy

and sharp.

*

It's important to remember--in all the discussions of celibacy--that many of the most essential figures in Catholic history, tradition, and piety are people that married, who had children, who led lives fully in practice of sexuality. Saint Monica was one of them (and thank God for that...or there wouldn't have been Augustine!), and this Monica has Kevin McMillan, who spent time with her at "The Devil's Place." He winks; she ponders the domestics of later married life. "Saint Monica Gives It Up" is a quirky (albeit different) female-centered version of "The Dead": Kevin's body and shape will always stay in Mary's memories. The poem's columned form and compression of stanza speaks to Biddinger's range in this chapbook (chapbooks in general are interesting projects: smaller than a poetry book, and yet often more resonant as they are entrenched in a particular project or persona).

This chapbook moves into deep territory, and yet it also resides so comfortably within that wry Catholic sense of humor Brian Doyle represented during his recent interview. "Saint Monica Composes a Five-Paragraph Essay on Girard's Theory of Triangular Desire" is so good, and so funny, that I'd recommend the collection on that piece alone. Here's the first sentence:

"Two Dominican Sisters and a Schnauzer sit on the back patio in late June, eating deviled eggs and day-old Wonder bread."

I'm sold. Biddinger goes in so many different directions in this poem (and yet all roads seem to lead back to Kevin): you need to find and read this one.

I laughed my way through this entire chapbook, but it's a tempered sort of humor. I refuse to name names, but so many poetic humorists leave me feeling flat and empty--not because I don't have a sense of humor, or that Catholics are uptight and stodgy (please), but because the type of humor often makes me question the weight of the words. Biddinger manages to be hilarious and worthwhile, creating gems like "Saint Monica's Sweet Sixteen":

It begins with a fistfight:
her boyfriend and uncle Paul

shoving each other during
an episode of Punky Brewster

In this chapbook Monica wins and loses. But, no matter what, one thing is on her mind:

"For the rest of the day she had to hold that keyhole shut while balancing her lunch tray, scribbling notes to Kevin McMillan, writing poetry about Kevin McMillan, sketching the likeness of Kevin McMillan gently on her thigh, passing the spelling tests up to Sister Rita, scanning Kevin McMillan’s paper and recoiling at his butchery of the word jocular."

It's a youthful obsession, to be sure, but it's also telling that Biddinger repeats the full name: it's a litany that nears prayer. And why shouldn't Monica live and love in this way? She listens to "Freebird." She's young.

And yet, in the midst of the humor and the domesticity and the sexuality, there's a poem that packs a pretty heavy theological punch. "Saint Monica Takes Communion Twice" appears in the final quarter of the chapbook, and it's a piece I've long since that about. The poem is what happens in the title: "She just got back in line and did it all over again."

Monica takes communion twice, and yet nobody notices. I wonder: are they watching? After I receive I usually have two choices: pray, head down, or let my thoughts wander and watch the litany of people walk forward. People I know, and people I don't. People that look differently, speak differently, think differently. Catholicism is a patchwork, and these final (or near-final) moments of Mass speak to that more than anything else. We are moving, we are praying, but we are all doing our own thing, and yet it exists in a bigger sense, in service of the Word, and in service of more.

So what does it mean to accept twice? Canon Law does stipulate (and please, someone correct me if I'm wrong here) that receipt is acceptable twice in a day in certain circumstances, including grave possibility of death.

What's fascinating about this poem, and what makes it so damn good, is that the body of Jesus is yoked with the body of the recipient. But isn't that the way it is supposed to be? Isn't the Host--and the process leading up to receipt--a way for us to not only pay respect and reverence to Christ, but also to become fully aware that we have bodies, and that these bodies exist in many different forms?

Monica is two forms, one person here:

"The first time it was the girl with hair tucked behind her ears. The second time it was the girl with hair in her face, hands unfolded, bra strap peeking out from the neckline of her sweater."

The poem continues to show the two paths of those forms as Monica lives. It's not only clever, it's theologically appropriate. Catholicism is a religion of mystery, and for me the Trinity is the apex of necessary philosophical murkiness: Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Separate forms, one body? It's a beautiful paradox. Biddinger allows Monica to sin in this chapbook, but to also set her sights on sainthood. Monica doesn't force that canonization: it's her destiny.