Love Marked Out

Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve,
was not with them when Jesus came.
So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.”
But he said to them,
“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands
and put my finger into the nailmarks
and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
John 20:19-31

When I look through weeping eyes, Lord,
aching for the light of day;
when I seek and cannot find you
in the shadows of the grave;
when I cannot recognize you,
Teacher, call again my name.

When I turn back to my old ways,
daunted in the face of dread,
wandering confusion's mazes,
tell me what the truth has said.
Come with me to my Emmaus:
Savior, stay and break the bread.

When all that my heart remembers
is your silence in the tomb;
sorrow drowns the burning embers
kindled in the upper room;
show me death was not the ending:
Lord and God, show me your wounds.

When my faith has failed to know you,
when I have to walk by sight,
call my name and bless the broken;
let me reach to touch your side.
Jesus, in your mercy, show me
love marked out for humankind.

Eglise du Saint-Sauveur, transept nord : l’incrédulité de Thomas. Photo By Cyr Manuel Evgenikos – Réunion des Musées Nationaux, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15154497

See

I know you're not among the dead,
the graves baptized with tears,
for you have risen as you said—
but still I want you here.

I cannot see you in the dawn,
the new-sprung blades of grass:
They bloom and wither and are gone;
as quick as breath they pass.

The songs of birds are not your song,
as sweetly as they sing.
They're silent when the night is long,
but your notes ever ring.

No, I can't hear you in the night
or see you in the day.
I walk by faith and not by sight,
but weary is the way.

Show me, O Lord, your hands and side,
and tell me by my name
there is a place for me inside,
untouched by any shame.

Yes, blest are those who have not seen—
But I still want to see.
And blest are they that can believe.
Lord, help my unbelief.

Doubting Thomas – Google Art Project By Unknown – illuminator – hgFUz6bXaLmUQQ at Google Cultural Institute maximum zoom level, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22185693

Bright

Bright shines the Easter sun,
now that the clouds have passed,
but we wait for another one,
a morning sure to last:

the cold earth we have closed,
the tamped-down mud of spring
beneath the green of spreading oaks,
uplifting, opening.

The dust God grasped at first 
to shape the forms of men,
when we have all returned to dust,
he'll take in hand again

and shape us, skin by limb
by liver, rib, and thumb,
all shining images of him 
who stand upon his palm,

and treasure every lash
of eyes that see for once
how glory's fadeless lightning flash
in all creation runs.

We'll raise our light-filled hands
and weep our diamond joys
to have each other back again,
when death has been destroyed.

By Prof. Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé Flora von Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz 1885, Gera, Germany – http://www.biolib.de, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8778

First the Blade

He said, “This is how it is with the kingdom of God; it is as if a man were to scatter seed on the land and would sleep and rise night and day and the seed would sprout and grow, he knows not how. Of its own accord the land yields fruit, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the grain is ripe, he wields the sickle at once, for the harvest has come.”
Mark 4:26-29

First the harrow, then the plow
turns and opens barren fields
where the seeds are trampled down
into wounds the sun will heal.

First the shoot and then the leaf
pierce the earth to catch the rain,
turning all this dead world green,
springing up to life again.

First the sprouting, then the growth
prophesying joy to come,
bounty pledging summer's troth
while the length'ning days run on.

First the blade and then the ear,
then the grain comes, rip'ning gold,
to the harvest of the year,
to the feast so long foretold.

First creation's sixfold day,
then the years' repeating rounds:
Death and life eachother chase
'til the final sun goes down,

then out of the ling'ring gloom
comes the day that will not end.
Seeds sprout up from every tomb.
Winter will not come again.

By User:Bluemoose – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=333105

The Word

In the beginning was the Word,
long before worlds began.
After the end it shall be heard,
spoken aloud again!

Spoken at first, it silent fell
under the reign of death,
now does it ring out as a bell,
sung on undying breath.

What is the word that shapes our sense,
filling the skies above,
echoing in the caverns' depths?
What could it be but love?

What was the silence of the grave
stilling the Word at last?
What could it be but love that gave,
filling death's endless grasp?

Stronger than death is that great love,
deeper than any hell,
truer than stories tell us of,
broader than ocean swells.

Into the silence now it speaks,
thunder with lightning's flame,
filling forever's depths and peaks,
calling us each by name!

Three Marys, by Henry Ossawa Tanner. From the left, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome approaching Jesus’ tomb. Oil on canvas, 42 × 50 in. Fisk University Art Galleries, Nashville, Tennessee. By Henry Ossawa Tanner – https://artandtheology.org/tag/henry-ossawa-tanner/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=132778182

Harrowed

To lie so long in darkness
that you forget your sight—
then shaken by a heartbeat,
pierced by a spear of light,
your chest, constricted, burning—
you choke through yards of dirt.
The breath of life returning,
and oh, dear God, it hurts.

Contort and cough and retch now;
remember how to gasp.
Your folded hands are stretched out
and pinned within his grasp.
Your legs are drawn and trembling,
weak as newborn pup,
the fragments reassembling
as you are lifted up.

How many days you lay there,
crumbling at last to dust!
Now all at once awakened,
ravenous, drenched in thirst,
still your son draws you upward,
Adam and Mother Eve,
to where he fills the cup full.
Take it, he says, and drink.

In Harrowing of Hades, fresco in the parecclesion of the Chora Church, Istanbul, c. 1315, raising Adam and Eve is depicted as part of the Resurrection icon, as it always is in the East. Photo By © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16873002

Valley

They shall live on the land that I gave to my servant Jacob,
the land where their fathers lived;
they shall live on it forever,
they, and their children, and their children’s children,
with my servant David their prince forever.
I will make with them a covenant of peace;
it shall be an everlasting covenant with them,
and I will multiply them, and put my sanctuary among them forever.
Ezekiel 37:21-28

And yea, though we must walk the valley here—
the road runs through the shadow of our death—
we shall not linger in the vale of tears,
but go to where the Shepherd gives us rest:

a homeland where the harvest never fails;
a city where the gates are open wide,
where peace lets out at last a long exhale;
a living spring that never will run dry;

where there are no more wars, no sword that falls;
no mothers weep to kiss their sons goodbye;
where no one trembles when the trumpet calls.
It says, The feast begins!  Come all inside!

For he has laid a table in our sight,
and there beside our foes we take our seats
where all our cups run over with new wine
and Christ himself breaks bread, that we may eat.

When shall we see the breaking of that dawn?
O, pierce the shadows!  Let us see the road.
We follow in the way all flesh has gone—
But lead us on, beyond where death can go.

Make straight the way, though all our steps may fail.
In darkness still, we shall not wander blind,
for we shall be your pilgrims in the vale:
Leave love and mercy there for us to find.

The Old Tower in the Fields (1884) By Vincent van Gogh – Christie’s, LotFinder: entry 5790823 (sale 2846, lot 267, New York, 7 May 2014), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32286355

Exodus

You come now to the strand:
The sea before you crawls,
and though you cling to your homeland,
another kingdom calls.

Your feet, already wet,
inch toward the farther shore.
You are a creature of the depths
you've never known before.

You try to dig right in,
to grip the gritty sand,
but each wave slipping back again
pulls home out of your hands.

Let go; O love, let go.
This Egypt is not yours.
You stand now on the Red Sea road,
with only one way forward:

through sorrow and through pain.
They will not stand like walls,
but plunge you in the heaving main.
You cannot swim at all.

They only promise this,
that whispers in the tide:
Beyond the sea, beyond abyss,
there is another side.

Crossing of the Red Sea By Nicolas Poussin – http://www.1st-art-gallery.com/Nicolas-Poussin/The-Crossing-Of-The-Red-Sea,-C.1634.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10289613

The 14th Station: Entombment

We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you,
because by your holy cross, you have redeemed the world.

Oh, but it was always thus:
Ash to ashes, dust to dust.
Wisdom knows our little day;
all who're born return to clay.

So it is since Adam's fall:
foul or guiltless, mortal all.
Ours the cross, the grave, the cold,
so you came, our death to hold.

When they laid you in the tomb,
what the light could pierce that gloom?
That's the shadow where we dwell:
Every grave our prison cell.

How could any dawn break through,
any glimmer less than you?
You alone could tear that veil,
so you did, by blood and nail.

Now you lie in Adam's grave,
chasing him you came to save
downward to the gates of hell,
mortal, like him, cold and still.

O you gates, lift up your heads.
Let him in, firstfruits of death.
He will take us from you, all.
Hail the day that saw him fall!

Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One,
have mercy on us.

By Carl Bloch – http://www.1st-art-gallery.com/Carl-Heinrich-Bloch/The-Burial-Of-Christ.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7984697

Mother

From Grace Hamman’s Jesus Through Medieval Eyes, the chapter on Christ as Mother. For Holy Week:

As Eve cried out in labor,
who bore the curse and Cain,
and wept again for Abel,
so you bear us in pain.

The body gaping open,
the wound of our first sin,
brings healing through the broken—
and new life enters in.

You walked the earth our brother,
formed with us of the dirt.
Now on the cross as mother,
your labor gives us birth

of water and the Spirit,
of holiness and blood.
The sin that we inherit
is drowned out in your flood.

Your body is out birthplace;
your sorrow is our hope.
O firstfruits of our dead race,
your life becomes our hope.

Your wounds O Lord, our shelter:
the shadow of your wings.
The cleft rock is our refuge,
O mother of all things!

The Birth of Ecclesia, fol. 2v (detail), ONB Han. Cod. 2554, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna. Made in Paris, 1225–49.