Tag: Easter

Resurrection

As the glad phoenix from his spicy bed
Bursts in vermilion splendour, as the bright
Sudden lightning-flash and orange-red
And leaping flames light up the night:

So is the thunder-clap of Jesus’ rising.
Consternation, joy, amazement all together
Confound us, shake us open for surprising
Truth to penetrate. HE IS RISEN – whether

Or not I believe it, he is truly living,
Unconstrained now, loving without limit,
Only my refusal may frustrate his giving.

But Gód’s blazing glory is beyónd what I can guess,
Negativity or evil cannot hinder, cannot dim it,
For his fire will enfold me and transmute me into Yes.

 

tRuth 2019

Chrism mass

A mass of chrism and the other oils
In little bottles, decanted at speed by vergers
While the diocese receives Christ at the bishop’s hand
And promises again to do his work.
And then they scatter, each with a year’s supply
Of confirmations, death-bed anointings,
Makings of new Christians,
Comfortings of chemotherapy endurers,
Healings of toxic memories.
Here is the risen Christ, in each encounter
With the holy oils, the kindly touch,
The hope unconquered.

 

tRuth 2019

Wednesday of Holy Week

 

Like sea-mist condensing from nowhere
The quiet deepens through the week
As the streets empty. When the blackbird speaks
He wakes an echo in the April evening
That falls as fountains from the air
Back into stillness. So we enter
The great silence, as an otter cleaving
Still water cleanly, and we wait. The centre
Of all things, the Christ mystery, we prepare
Our spacious silence for receiving.
Together we enter his eclipse; a bleak
And seeping sadness chills us into prayer
Like those who loiter in a graveyard early, grieving
Before sunrise. Here we wait, this week.

 

tRuth 2019

Palm Sunday

Today Jesus rides in triumph
through a rain of flowers
to his kingdom, on Brother Ass,
humble and holy, simple and true.
Every day he rides still into his own
on Brother Ass, Brother Body,
the patient, grumbling root
of every spiritual flowering.
Who can find Jesus without Brother Ass to help her?
Who can be real whose Brother Ass has strayed?
Brother, you deserve fine flowers of cherry,
snowdrifts of apple-blossom, to welcome
this Easter king in his holiness.
I like thistles, mumbles Brother Ass,
Yum-yum, thank you. Can you see
my rider now? Yum-yum, thank you.

 

tRuth 2019

St Francis used to refer to his body as Brother Ass. Towards the end of his life he asked pardon of Brother Ass for having behaved so harshly towards it by his overzealous asceticism.

Sabbath

His hands are bound about with linen bands,
Still now, no more with vivid gesture telling
Stories to thrill to; healing, kindly hands,
Their black wounds hidden by the sweetly smelling

Myrrh-soaked bindings. And the women weeping
Have turned away and left him dumbly lying
Like a thing in the darkness, and when the light comes leaping
In the spring dawn, he will still be sleeping.

The day long of lamenting and of crying,
Here he will be, still and cold and lonely,
In his last rest. Where has he gone, the flying

Soaring life of him? Deep down, defying
Death in his den, setting them free, the only
Lord of Life, raising the dead to joy undying.

 

tRuth 2019

image © Liberanapoli CC BY SA 3 (Wikimedia Commons)

The Virgin and the Angel, Holy Saturday

Go away.
I do not want your cheap consolation.
You are too beautiful in your flaming robes.
What do you know of death and loss?
That is for you to teach me.
I have not come to speak this time
But to sit in silence
Watching out the night.

My God, my God!
Would that I had died instead of you,
My son, my son.
Yes.

The moon is rising, it’s getting cold.
He is beyond reach of cold now in his dark hole.
Hush, hush. These strange human tears wound me like stones.

He suffered and served you for this?
Where was the flaming chariot, why
Did you abandon him to sorrow and grief?
Yes.

Was he anointed for affliction
My innocent boy, disfigured
Struck down by God – oh.
Yes.

Is that it? Isaiah?
‘The LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all’?

Very well. I think I understand
But let me alone a little longer
To weep for him
It’s still hard for me, my Lord.
Hush, hush. Let them flow.

Let me tell you a story, my Lady,
one you already know.
When Israel escaped at the Red Sea
and the chariots and horsemen were drowned
we burning ones began to sing before the Glory
and he said
‘The work of my hands is drowned in the sea,
and you would offer me a song?’
And we saw the tears of the Holy One, blessed be He.

What are you telling me?
Does my Lord weep with all who weep
And suffer agony in cruel death
Is it on Him the chastisement of our sin is laid?
You saw him bear it royally upon the cross.
Him? My boy? Messiah yes, but this is blasphemy.

Have you forgotten that night filled with angels
When he was born?
Hidden in your nature
Emptied of glory the Glory walked
Overflowing with love like tears.

Yes. I know it now, so I can let him go
In peace back to his heavenly mansion.
Do not smile.
What more have I not understood?
No, do not tell me. I am very weary
And no longer young. I will sleep now.
Sleep, my Lady. You will see him tomorrow.

 

tRuth 2002

NB the story Gabriel tells can be found in the Talmud, Megillah 10b and Sanhedrin 39b.

image Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Emmaus

They left in haste; the loaf still stands
Innocent, calm among the cups
– As a hurled stone might on the sands
Whose passing churned the waters up –
Because the stranger, as he supped
Had blessed it with his broken hands.

 

tRuth 92

 

I wrote this years and years ago, but I still like it: the one strong image of a stone sploshing into deep water, making a splash in more ways than one.

Easter evening

The choirs have gone home, and in the grey spring
Dusk the church grows still. The coals
That glowed red in the thurible are dimming
While belated incense falls in veils
Like mist in quiet fields at evening.

The resurrection songs have sounded bright
And joyful in the morning, but the pale
Hospice patient will not last the night.
Death still reigns this side of the veil
And bitter loss like icy rain, like blight.

But the outrage that we feel at death is pointing
To the fact that love outlasts the body’s death.
Reality wears veils, and hiding, hinting
Shows truth too big to grasp, like breath
Of incense clouds evoking light that’s glinting

Just out of sight, where other songs resound
Beyond the veil, a place that yet is strange.
When at twilight our turn comes around
To part the mists, though everything is changed,
Familiar voices welcome us as found.

 

tRuth 2018

 

image copyright tRuth http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/