L. and I are in the back pews of a very crowded Spanish mission-basilica, filling even more as we sit, for a funeral of a young woman. The procedures and processions are elaborate. There are several officiators. The liturgy is maximum length and highly complex.

When it comes time for communion, L. and I go up to the altar together, as she follows me. I take communion, but I notice that she requests from the priest additional wafers—and he brings her a heaping handful. She then gives this handful to me. I am not quite sure what to do, it seeming awkward just to stow them in my pocket. But that’s what I do.

We go back to our places, and L. leaves shortly thereafter while I stay to take in every jot and tittle of the liturgy.  I realize that I am wearing only my bathrobe and nothing else. Still, it seems I am thinking of going up to receive communion for a second time. I am alarmed about being barely clad and barefoot.

All of a sudden, what appears suspended upright in my mind is a single, large peacock feather with a bold iridescent eye and surrounding fronds. Then, a large rectangular piece of parchment appears, and under a horizontal line on the lower edge of it, is a row of multitudes of caricatures. Below them is another line, and then another long row with more multitudes of smaller caricatures.

In my mind, I begin to work on a layout with the peacock feather as an image above the lower rows.  Though the liturgy is nearly done, I am charged with creating some sort of missalette—as a very substantial document.

Then I discover that the eye of the feather forms a lens for looking through—for perceiving more detail of the caricatures in multitude.

I am immediately aware that I am gazing through this lens into immeasurable depths.