Then all those virgins got up and trimmed their lamps.
The foolish ones said to the wise,
‘Give us some of your oil,
for our lamps are going out.’
But the wise ones replied,
‘No, for there may not be enough for us and you.
Go instead to the merchants and buy some for yourselves.’
—Matthew 25:1-13

And in the end we’re empty flasks.
The Bridegroom comes: What will he find?
His entourage at midnight blind,
the virgins sleeping at their tasks.

I filled the flask and spilled it out,
for all I purchase I upend
with nothing but a clumsy hand
to clutch at hope against my doubt.

I go to buy the oil again—
so I have spent my living days
retracing and undoing ways,
relearning how to say Amen.

My lantern barely flickers here
but smokes and gutters hour by hour.
To keep it lit’s not in my power.
You, Lord, must set it burning clear.

Pour out a surer oil, O Christ,
that not on my poor works depends,
and fill the flask with steady hands
to burn all night for you at last.

Then when you come that light will shine
to welcome all you call inside.
The virgins shall become the bride:
I shall be yours and you, Lord, mine.

A speaker sounds the tolling of the bells
recorded elsewhere—there are no bells here
nor ever have been in this new-build tower.
The call to Mass, the groaning funeral knells,
the Angelus, they ring out loud and clear
and mark each day the passing of the hour.
And we know all the news this music tells
yet feel no deep vibration of our sphere
in sounds that make the hearts of mortals cower.
Though this remove we live at senses quells—
scarcely we note the turning of the year
or feel the wind or run from sudden shower—
still something in the ringing yet compels,
and at its call some vestiges appear
of that in us no progress can devour:
The ocean in a million different shells
recedes, and we look out in mortal fear
for winter comes and withers every flower—
and yet the tide returns, the ocean swells,
and after winter spring again draws near.
The bells ring on, and nothing dulls their power.

Joseph Sattler: Karfreitag (Good Friday) In: Was das Herz bewegt. Deutsche Gedichte ausgewählt von Reinhard Heuer. 12. Auflage. Langensalza, Verlag von Julius Beltz. Berlin/ Leipzig o.J. [ca. 1932], p. 224. Originally published in one of the “Kunst und Leben” calendars, Verlag Fritz Heyder, Berlin-Zehlendorf., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=193253822

We bear each other ‘til we bury each other.
I’ll turn the earth for you, or you for me,
and make a place to lie, a sky to smother
what breathes no more and needs no light to see,
the eyes being closed forever.  Yet may it be
something still lives of all that once had been,
that we may keep each other, all unseen.

‘Til that day comes, oh, let us keep each other.
What else have we but God upon the land?
And he so far at times seems not our brother,
but you are here—then let me feel your hand!
I give you mine.  Some days my claws extend
but I am yours, and you, as sharp as I,
are mine.  We bear each other under sky.

And we go on, lock hands before, behind
with all the others, pilgrims on the way.
We try to draw our claws in, to be kind,
who none of us have more than this brief day,
and sometimes all that we can do is pray.
One step and then the next, the road goes on.
We all together stumble into dawn.

And may there be still others, as a cloud,
who reach their hands out to us as we go;
and may we take them, being no longer proud
but brought, as they were brought once, low and low;
and may we let them lead us slow and slow
and step by step the long, dim road they trod
until we stand before the throne of God.

Then will we see at last, see face to face
what we had glimpsed in one another here.
If I have been your cross, so you my grace,
as all of us bear up each other’s bier,
the weight on every shoulder jewel dear.
We bear each other onward unto death
when God shall bear us on upon his breath.

Fresco of Apocalypse from an Athos monastery By Anonymous Greek painter – http://ebox.nbu.bg/aton2012/articles1.php, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=68008232

Today is theirs: Recall their names
and whisper them into the dark
left by the dying of their flames,
extinguished now and left no mark
except the flare: I close my eyes
and see the after image there,
and break the hush as faces rise,
their names in litany my prayer.
These syllables upon my tongue
hold volumes more than I can tell.
Though some died old and some died young
I loved them all before they fell,
or else I knew them not at all
but loved the ones who loved them here.
Then may I will use this day to call
their names who lived before my year:
O you who trampled death by death,
who came as dust to save the dust,
hear now the names upon my breath
and let not one of them be lost. Amen.

Tapers (long thin candles) in a church By Andrew Shiva / Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=52308084

After this I had a vision of a great multitude,
which no one could count,
from every nation, race, people, and tongue.
They stood before the throne and before the Lamb,
wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.
—Revelation 7:9-14

And there I saw
around you, each a spark,
the multitude you draw
and, burning in the dark,
on every heart your law,
each brow your mark.

Who then are these,
their hunger righteousness,
in myriad poverties
patient until you bless
the souls no one else sees
in their distress?

They are the ones
who, burning with your flame,
shine out like lesser suns
and brilliant make your name;
to go where mercy runs,
like you became.

What is the word
incised upon them here?
The ringing voice they heard,
companion drawing near,
a hope never deferred
but sounding clear:

Your sign, O Christ,
in hunger and in thirst,
in riches sacrificed,
in mercy to the worst,
‘til earth is paradised
and last are first.

Now they are blest,
their hunger satisfied,
their mourning laid to rest
in feasting you provide,
to see what they confessed
there at your side.

Beato angelico, cristo glorificato nella corte del paradiso, 1423-24, da s. domenico, fiesole 05 By Fra Angelico – Own work Sailko Taken on 1 March 2017, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=67529402

It wasn’t long ago you walked
on this good earth and felt the sun,
but years now other ways you’ve stalked
that I will know when mine are done.
You are what I am coming to
as sunset comes for every dawn.
How can I bear to look at you?
The features that I knew are gone,
your face the face of all who pass,
anonymous as reaper Death:
“All men shall flourish as the grass
and wither at a winter’s breath.”
The skin shrinks closer to the bone;
the eyes are lost.  The eyes are lost
but see what I have never known—
yet will, when I my days exhaust.
Why have you come to me, old friend
unrecognizable as such?
There is a way we both shall wend:
You call me to it with a touch.
There is a way we both must find
as all men have, time out of mind.
There is a guide you walk behind—
May he be kind; may he be kind.

Death By Bonifacio Bembo – Visconti-Sforza tarot deck, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15846876

Woe to them! They followed the way of Cain, abandoned themselves to Balaam’s error for the sake of gain, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.
These are blemishes on your love feasts, as they carouse fearlessly and look after themselves. They are waterless clouds blown about by winds, fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead and uprooted.
They are like wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shameless deeds, wandering stars for whom the gloom of darkness has been reserved forever.
—Jude 11-13

O patron of the hopeless lost,
St. Jude, take me into your care
and save my heart from its despair
with mercies I cannot exhaust.

For I have loved a wandering star,
rejoicing when he passed in sight
and weeping in the empty night
when he has strayed to quadrants far.

He bears the image of the sun
that pours its life into our clay,
and still he shines along his way
though brighter passes he may shun.

Let not the image there go dim;
let it not gutter out of reach.
The sun has surely light for each
no matter, no, how far from him.

My star is wandering in the dark:
His orbit’s road is long, is long.
Then let my hope be strong, be strong
against the fading of his spark.

Saint of the hopeless, hope for me
that wandering stars may find their way
into the sun’s eternal day,
and I his shining face may see.  Amen.

Veladoras – San Judas Tadeo, By Juan Carlos Fonseca Mata – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85458866

I go to Mass.  The same words every time:
in thought and word and deed how I have sinned,
my grievous fault and my omission’s crime.
This Kyrie will vanish in the wind
like all the others have, its grace rescind,
so to remain unsullied by my grime.

Though all I ever want is to be good,
still all I ever am is not enough.
“Be perfect as your Father—” Lord, who could,
unless you make us of some other stuff?
I do what I should not—my virtue’s bluff—
and do not do the things I know I should.

I have turned back.  I am a pillar of salt
forever gazing at the distant flame.
We say the Confiteor.  Lame-tongued, I halt
along the words detailing all my shame
‘til someone else trips, fumbles all the blame:
“through my fault, my fault, my most gracious fault.”

And for one second it is Vigil night
as in my darkness this Exultet rings:
O necessary sin that made all bright,
that brought a savior.  Even now it brings
a mercy which may fly on swiftest wings
away, yet here a moment did alight.

Kyrie da Missa de Notre Dame nas obras completas de Guillaume de Machaut, between 1380 and 1395, By manuscrito sob a supervisão do autor – [1] (164v), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=45121550

He said to him,
“You shall love the Lord, your God,
with all your heart,
with all your soul,
and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and the first commandment.
The second is like it:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”
—Matthew 22:34-40

I do not love you as I ought
or as the law and prophets taught.
O God, though you are all I’ve sought,
I do not love you as I ought:

to love you, heart and mind and soul,
as if those three were one and whole.
How can the imperfect reach that goal,
to love you, heart and mind and soul,

or love my neighbor as myself,
whom I have loved above all else?
I do not love you for yourself
or love my neighbor as myself.

Let my confession come to you:
My love is only partly true.
That it be whole in all I do,
let me confession come to you.

Though heart and mind may come undone,
the race before me must be run.
Then hear, all things: The Lord is one
though heart and mind may come undone,

and love shall make us one in him.
When here our fractured sight goes dim,
his light each face shall newly limn,
and love shall make us one in him.

Caritas, The Seven Acts of Mercy, pen and ink drawing by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1559. Koenigs collection, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen – Google Arts & Culture — YgFO-521RPoPdw YgFO-521RPoPdw, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21961843

Look on us as we lift these empty hands
filled but with air and cupped around our lack.
We have no incense for your burning brands,
no fragrant smoke to stain the rafters black;
only our prayers rise up from lips that crack.
On legs that will not bend, the suppliant stands.

See all our perfect offerings are lost:
We would come walking to you on our knees
but that arthritis gnarls us in its frost,
would sing your praise through an asthmatic wheeze
but cough and choke.  Look down, O God who sees,
on what we would have given, bar the cost.

Here are the widow’s mites: body and soul—
what’s left of them to watch the setting sun—
as cracked and hollow as a broken bowl,
so shattered—were these fragments ever one?
Now we hold nothing, and the day is done,
nothing, O Lord, unless you make us whole.

If you will not, you must be satisfied
to take the mere intention for the deed.
Do not forget we tried, O God, we tried.
What can we bring when all we have is need?
Yet here we are: Oh, let us come and feed
on what your love alone can now provide.  Amen.

Manos abuelita 101 años. By Correogsk – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=91290270