I am at her feet and I am praying.

But she, well … you couldn’t exactly say she sees me or hears me.

She is reflecting.

In the way one says that calm, pure water reflects.

The infant she holds in her left arm is the one who hears me. His ear is turned toward me.

His heart beats …

And the proof that it beats is the long thin hand, raised over him, of his mother, who listens to him.

She listens to him listening.

And the hand of the child in its turn rests on the mother’s arm.

Upon the maternal artery.

The Virgin of Brangues is a virgin who works.

And here I am, showing up at a job already well under way.