You visited us once before
to pardon us our sin.
Come once again, O Lord; restore,
and let new life begin!

So Mary and Elizabeth,
each in her time of bliss,
as Truth and sister Kindness, met;
as Peace and Justice, kissed.

As Justice looking down from high,
Faith springing from the earth,
the glory of your drawing nigh
was in their children’s birth.

We looked upon your mercy, then;
salvation we received.
Let every tongue cry out again:
Blest are you who believed!

And cry out still, who wait your day,
salvation drawing near,
when Justice in the van makes way
and Right precedes you here.

We’ll dance our joy to see you come
as John within the womb.
When Peace strikes up the pipe and drum,
we’ll dance out of the tomb!

Deodato Orlandi, 1300–10, scene from the Life of John the Baptist (Gemäldegalerie, Berlin) Photo By Sailko – Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40949973

The little crèche I’ve already set up,
and hidden Jesus on the kitchen shelf,
the waiting manger empty as a cup
that he will fill at Christmas with himself.
Today, though, is an ordinary day
that needs caffeine, the ordinary way.

I set my cup out, kettle about to boil,
and fish around in the clutter—now it sings—
to find the teabags.  There, in all the coil,
the child appears, a thing among the things.
I glance but do not see him—then I do,
with teabags, flashlights, junk hullaballoo.

The naked porcelain’s incongruous:
I see him, and the junk and I transform.
He builds a stable from my daily fuss
and comes a beggar unto beggars born,
an animal among the animals.
I worship, making tea here in the stalls.

My kitchen shelf, photo by me.

We know the Bridegroom’s coming soon:
Each night we wait the same.
Through midnight, dawn, and even noon,
we keep the lamps aflame.

So we have waited year by year.
But all we’d laid in store,
it could not wait ‘til he came near.
We ate, and lay in more.

And every day we do our work—
or not, as it may be—
but if we labor, if we shirk,
we know that he will see,

for he has given each a task,
to see to it without fail
that there is oil to fill the flask
and milk to fill the pail.

So year by year we keep the feast;
and year by year we fast;
and someday we will be released,
for he will come at last.

Yes, he will come—of that be sure—
and then it is too late
to lay another feast in store
when he is at the gate.

But then real feasting will begin,
with fasting ever gone.
He’ll douse the lamps and lead us in
where it is ever dawn.

Three wise virgins appear with Christ on Strasbourg Cathedral. Photo By Rebecca Kennison – Own work, CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1638388

When John the Baptist heard in prison of the works of the Christ,
he sent his disciples to Jesus with this question,
“Are you the one who is to come,
or should we look for another?”
—Matthew 11:2-11

A cell as barren as the desert sands,
yet somehow here God’s voice has fallen dumb,
and in the drought the seed of doubt expands
and roots.  Are you the one who is to come?
He knew where he was headed and where from:
The journey interrupted, incomplete,
his mind’s as crowded as a city street.

There children call a tune but will not dance;
they taunt each other with a mocking dirge.
Their laughing voices pierce him like a lance,
the echo of his shouting, of his urge
to cry repentance: Knife in hand, a surgeon
cuts away the sickly flesh to save
whatever’s left from going to its grave.

A life spent in the desert: What is left?
He’s skin and bones and ashes banking down
from what was blazing once. His heart bereft
of its inferno ticks in his camel gown.
You do—you don’t—live up to your renown.
You are—you aren’t—the one who will baptize
the world in flame. And now his own fire dies.

The light he loves so much is getting dim.
It will go out—the road that all men go.
He knows the one to come has come to him—
the burning in the desert told him so,
and he must dim himself that you may grow.
He lets the ashes cool, his tongue go still.
If he is empty, God will come and fill.

The desert never really lay outside.
He’s always carried it, the light, the heat,
within himself. But now the springs have dried,
oasis vanished. Here, then, will you meet?
He will not touch the sandals of your feet
if you should walk there in his silent gloom
and make—somehow—this inner desert bloom.

Graffito with the representation of a standing man with the cosmic cross in a square (probably John the Baptist) – found at the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth – End of the 1st century BC. Photo By gugganij – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3976839

A herald voice crows out the coming dawn
as swans upon the wing sound the aubade:
“Awake! Arise! The night is shortly gone.
Make straight the way! Prepare to see your God!
But comfort, comfort: Stand and lift your head.
Though all things fall, it’s comfort and not dread.

“The mountains must be toppled; peak and bluff
rubbled to level off each valley’s breadth,
yet earth has neither heights nor cliffs enough
to fill the valley of the shade of death,
and there into the lowest trench he’ll go
to lift the fallen from the final woe.

“For we are grass. We flower and then we fade;
but he, eternal love, would have us stay;
and this he’ll do to save the flower he made:
Endure the night that we may have the day.
Himself the highest mountain, he’ll sink down
and in the icy streams of death he’ll drown.

“And we shall glide, as swans upon a lake
of glass will sail unhindered; we shall stride
upon the level road our Lord shall make
and in his presence evermore abide.
When mountains crumble, stand and lift your head:
He comes to raise the valleys and the dead.”

Young Cygnus cygnus in Paunküla Reservoir Estonia. By Salura – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23477590

When John the Baptist heard in prison of the works of the Christ,
he sent his disciples to Jesus with this question,
“Are you the one who is to come,
or should we look for another?”
Jesus said to them in reply,
“Go and tell John what you hear and see:
the blind regain their sight,
the lame walk,
lepers are cleansed,
the deaf hear,
the dead are raised,
and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them.
And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me.”
—Matthew 11:2-11

Are you the one we wait for,
the one who is to come,
or have we come too late for
the speaking of the dumb?

For still our ears hear nothing
and still our eyes are blind.
Our speech is empty bluffing;
our hearts are all unkind.

Our hands are clamped in fury,
that should be filled with bread.
The hungry still are hungry;
the dead are all still dead.

We ask you, then, the marvels
that you had said you’d give:
the desert turned to gardens,
the dead now made to live.

And something in us blossoms
when you begin to speak:
The poor receive the gospel—
shall we have what we seek?

O, touch our ears to hear you,
and touch our hearts and eyes
to see and draw more near you.
Let your bright day arise.

Saint John the Baptist in Prison Sends His Disciples to Question Jesus, drawing, By Creator:Ermenegildo Lodi – This file was donated to Wikimedia Commons as part of a project by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. See the Image and Data Resources Open Access Policy, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=60841051

Pass over me, O Lord.  I do not want
the barren desert of my heart to bloom,
abode of ostriches and jackals’ haunt,
for we live comfortably in the gloom.
The light breaks through at times, and it breaks me,
the vision on its own a kind of doom.
The desert’s not so bad if I can’t see,
but if I can, what misery it is.
Take back the light, O God, and let me be.
I know you want to save the world, but this,
where I have cultivated every thorn
with my own blood when sweeter rains did miss?
It was a garden once but now forlorn
it lies beneath a long, unbroken night,
and you know what it costs to be reborn.
Not locusts and wild honey, but on spite
I’ve lived, and on the bitterest streams
until I’d swear there’s venom in my bite.
I like your light; I like the way it gleams,
but knives gleam, too.  The harrow and the plow,
their edges shine like diamonds in the seams
of this stone heart you’ll break if I allow.
You’ll grind it down to dust and drench it well—
You’re ready for the planting even now,
but I am not.  Like cancer in the cell
your seed in my poor soil would be my death,
and I am more afraid than I can tell
to let you share my earth, my heart, my breath.
How can an infant’s coming here so daunt?
How can it not, when you turn stone to flesh?
Yet how can I refuse to be your crèche?

Egypt, Late Period, Dynasty 26 or later – Jackal – 1940.614 – Cleveland Museum of Art By https://clevelandart.org/art/1940.614, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77266931

When the deserts turn to gardens
and the sands to seas of wheat
where you drown our sin in pardons,
all the flocks will come to eat,
from the open skies descending
to the orchards you have made.
They will sing their exile’s ending
where the eggs will then be laid.

In the plot your love encloses,
all the mournful chants are stilled;
barren hillsides bloom with roses;
and the empty nests are filled.
Now the fledgling is a mother
and the granddam tends a brood
at their home—they want no other—
in the orchard of the rood.

Though our wings are prone to falter,
you are gentle with the weak.
Let this garden be your altar
where we find the nest we seek!
Bless the nest and bless the nestlings—
Oh, the mercies of your gift!—
casting down the hawk sky-cresting,
but the sparrows, Lord, you lift.

Painted tiles with design of birds from Qajar dynasty, Iran By Unknown author – Photo by davidmus.dk, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25157065

The coins you gave I buried in a field.
Each day the trumpets and the drums
I hear yet closer as you come.
I’ll dig them up, and harvest what they yield.

For I hear, too, the rattle and the clink—
the talent, drachma, shekel, mite,
they know their worth and sing aright:
“This gleam was meant to buy the thirsty drink,

“to clothe the naked, shut the winter out.
To bury gold is as to steal
the bread that is our savior’s meal—
that he’ll redeem us, too, oh, make no doubt.

“We were his glory buried in the vein,
and all creation groans to see
our beauty from your hand set free.
We shall be worthless when he comes to reign

“except as diadems to crown his own,
and even then to crown his praise,
Amen and Ancient of our Days,
the saints will cast us down before his throne!

“And we shall be at last as we were made:
We shall be beautiful and bright,
but dim beside his lasting light.
And you shall shine, by no dark thoughts betrayed.”

I hear them, as I hear the church bell chime
that tells the coming of the end.
This is the hour my ills to mend:
Oh, let me dig them up while there is time

and spend this world’s dishonest wealth to gain
a pearl of greater price than all,
in answer to your mercy’s call,
a crown to cast down when you come to reign!

The Parable of the Talents, depicted by artist Andrei Mironov. Oil on canvas, 2013 – Own work, Andrey Mironov See also ticket:2015070410013036http://artmiro.ru/photo/religija_zhanrovaja_kartina/pritcha_o_talantakh/4-0-398, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30528194

How many times, Jerusalem,
the hen spread out her wings
for you to shelter under them
from all the weather brings,

as if to gather all the flock
to refuge in his arm,
secure as on the highest rock
and safe from every harm?

Now darkness gathers near at hand
and thunder fills the air.
Against this fury, who can stand?
What help shall come? From where?

Yet this is but his wings outspread:
Oh, see the mother hen
who had no place to lay his head
has come to us again!

And now upon the storm he rides—
What shelter shall we take?
Our peace within his heart abides,
laid open for our sake.

Then come, O come, Jerusalem;
full soon the storm will start.
His wings are spread: Run under them
and shelter in his heart!

Poules de race faverolles (Limoges, Haute-Vienne, France) By Babsy – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=27067797