He tries the door to the stairwell as if the polished knob will play with the ease of a manual; soft light pools in through the archway. As his skilled right hand falls away an old discouragement shows on his face. We leave the soul who’s come to pray, the burnished pipes in their gaudy case. His mood, somber and cathedral, has every intention to stay, like the last guest at a funeral who refuses to go on his way and wearies his host on a solemn day. Beyond the tone of that sacred place, espresso machines brew petit café, the burnished pipes in their gaudy case. Then, as pressure released from a pedal, or wind pumped out through an airway, gloom shifts. Part of the place, like a gargoyle, his heart still swells at the pay; the problem, he says, is the liturgy, the rites that stop the flow of grace as his faithful hands sustain, decay the burnished pipes in their gaudy case. Content to be one of the lay, he browses the town’s antiques, traces the hookahs neatly arrayed, the burnished pipes in their gaudy case.