The Ballad of St. Joan:
A Cautionary Tale
©2011 Susan Noyes Anderson (poem only)
Joan didn’t want to sing next week.
What happened to free choice?
She didn’t need a chance to grow;
she had a perfect voice.
“So hold the guilt trip, please,” thought she,
“and just leave me alone…
The Church might want to share it, but
this talent is my own.”
She loved to sing. She really did,
but only now and then.
She sang for Easter; and when
Christmas came, she’d sing again.
It wasn’t like they paid her;
she did all this stuff for free,
and sometimes that accompanist
would miss a note…or three.
Joan’s talent was a cut above,
the kind that lifts and lingers.
She clung to it so tightly that
it slipped right through her fingers.
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Susan Noyes Anderson
Susan Noyes Anderson is the author of At the End of Your Rope, There’s Hope, Deseret Book, ©1997; Awaken Your Spiritual Power: The Fairy Godmother Isn’t Coming!, Karisma Press, ©1999; and His Children (poetry only, photos are by Anita Schiller), Vantage Point Press, ©2003.