[James Brancheau]

I mostly just wanted to pop in and echo the praise. Great stuff, Glenn. It is among your best, imo. I might prefer “taken” over “stolen,” but that's not such a big deal to me. And I do like “bow” here. In another context, it might be awkward describing bending over as such, but here it nicely colors how the speaker sees it, or would like to see it, and it’s consistent with what’s going on in the poem. (Come to think of it, bowing is a rather accurate way of describing the motion itself, if the action is unsustained. The word also brought “genuflect” to my mind, or a kind of genuflecting gesture—but that’s probably just me and didn’t really factor into my approval of “bow.” Fwiw.)

The other reason I wanted to chime in is to try to persuade you to keep “to the four corners of the balsa frame.” It was one of my favorite moments of the original. In a way, it’s somewhat like your word choice “bow,” which could be suggestive too. For me, the four corners brilliantly alludes to the sign of the cross. And right there in the last stanza, it is perfectly placed as well.