If there is yet hope for this flower

(drying, dying, disconnected from its source),

then take it,

attach it once more to

the stem from which it fell.

Let decaying petals be fresh once again.

Give water, give sunlight.

Photo-synthesise: give life.

If there is yet life in this body

(I cling to that hope) –

then take it, blast it, lift it into your light:

then it will not atrophy, die.

Defy the laws that work on

bodies and on soil, the cycles

that drag all flesh to the ground.

Defy them now.

If there is yet breath beyond

the walls of this tomb (I see

a body moving through a gap

by the stone), then roll away

the mammoth rock between

that life and the sun’s light.

Let air re-enter that body’s tombs;

let graves and passageways respire.

Defy the law that says: all flesh is grass.

Let no grass grow over this tomb.

the fig-tree does not bud

and

our vines are without grapes

and

our olives do not grow;

the leaves are bare and

the harvest is

the slowest yet.

But wait.

And stand

at your watches and

station yourselves.

Look to the ramparts.

Look to see,

And hear:

your heart will pound;

let your cracked lips quiver

at the sound:

behold, though it linger,

it will come; it will surely,

surely come.

Look to the fig-tree and

watch it bud;

look to the grape-vine and

watch it yield fruit;

look to the olive branch;

look to the blood-red sap of the trees;

look to the hills, the

empty hills,

for there you will see

what you never had hoped.

Though

the fig-tree waits yet to bud

and

the grape-vines are still barren and bare,

though

the olive crop fails and

the harvest is

the slowest, yet

look to the tree, look

to the fig-tree:

it will bud soon;

it will not delay…

Jesus arrives in Jerusalem and enters the Temple. The fig-tree is not in bloom, and the Temple is not in order.

The King in His Throne-Room

He had been here before and found then

What he found now: the defiance of the proud.

He looked for mercy and found sacrifice,

For contrition, found complacency and,

Where worship should have been, he

Found tables dripping with money and

Stained with the blood he saw on the hands

Of the proud, the money-changers, who

Manned these tables. Whip in hand, zeal in

His heart, he – now, as then – tipped them all over,

Burning with all the anger of the king who

Had come to find his lands mismanaged, his

Crown mislaid, his throne in disrepair and

His regent in the bedchamber of his dearest bride.

The king shook the temple’s dust from his feet.

Outside, the fig-tree withered and died.

Two more poems from earlier in the sequence, both dealing with the pilgrims approaching Jerusalem for the Passover. The second poem, “Even His Own Brothers”, goes back to early in Jesus’ ministry, when his unbelieving brothers try to convince Jesus to go to Jerusalem in order to make a big impression.

Pilgrimage

I rejoiced when they said unto me:

Let us go, let us leave

For the house of the Lord. Let us now go.

There we will go, bringing our peace.

There we all go. We meet there in peace.

There the tribes go, joyful and praising,

To the city, the temple, the king’s city, where

His throne stands. The city stands

Compacted together. There

We will all meet,

Before the king’s throne,

In his city, this city of peace.

Jerusalem, we’re near you; will you receive

Us as your guests? Will

You receive us in peace?

Jerusalem, we are now here:

Our feet are standing

In your uneasy gates –

Even His Own Brothers

(John 7:3-5)

Jesus’ brothers said to him, “You ought to leave here and go to Judea, so that your disciples may see the miracles you do. No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world.” For even his own brothers did not believe in him.

1.

He shook off the taunts of the well-intentioned:

The right time for me has not yet come.

Had he not said the same to his mother

A few months ago, when the wine had run dry

And the master of the wedding had asked

For assistance? Had he then, any more than now,

Been concerned with social niceties or

The demands of public life? Had he courted

Then, or now, the limelight?

Yet that day the best wine had flowed:

Wine to gladden the heart. Though

Evading the piercing glances of

A public who demanded to know each step he took,

Whose clothes he wore and which brands he would support

When he overthrew Rome, or those who poked him

With sticks and said, Show us a miracle, Christ,

He would not neglect the work he came to do:

The bringing of new wine, the birth of a new kingdom,

In, and yet not of, this world that he trod.

2.

For you any time is right,

Said the brother whom they did not understand,

The eldest, the crazed one, the public magician who

Refused to turn up to his most glamorous gigs.

The world cannot hate you,

but it hates me because…

By now they had tuned out. They played a flute for him

Yet he would not dance, a dirge but he would not mourn.

There was no pleasing this one.

Back to their homes they went,

To the regularity of wood shaped with chisel and plane,

While in Judea he hid himself until just the right time

To shake up the self-congratulating party with

The harsh, dissident cymbal of the truth.

Not yet back to our homes,

Not yet back to our nets,

Not yet back from the death of the day before,

We waited and rested.

Not yet grieving,

Not yet sorry,

Not yet alive to the death and the night of it all,

We rested and sat

Somewhere amid waiting and wanting.

Not yet found in his net,

Not yet caught or freed,

Not yet free in the water,

Not yet alive in the breeze,

Not yet waiting or wanting,

Amid the waiting and resting and the night of the death before

We sat

And by us all the Sabbath floated

In a curl of rest beyond us

And in the breeze of the water around us

We waited amid the rest of our wanting

And sat, not yet resting.

This poem belongs earlier in the collection. It is a flashback to Peter, James and John’s climb to the top of the mountain, where they saw Jesus transfigured, in glory, standing with Moses and Elijah. I wonder if Peter would have thought to this back moment somewhere after Jesus’ arrest; I wonder how the memory would have seen to him then, not yet really understanding who Jesus was or what he was doing. Would it have seemed a taunting reminder of what could have been but seemed to have failed?

The Dazzling Whiteness

The others had stayed below while we climbed,

John with a steady assurance and James

Somewhere not too far behind, the Lord at the front

Setting the pace and me, frustrated, eyes on the summit

And the space between me and the peak somehow taunting.

At the top, short of breath, where the ground seemed to catch

My eye more than the sky did, I saw a glimmer of light

From above, and looking up to the source, there I found

The Lord, all ablaze, his face like the sun and his clothes:

They were whiter than all the world’s bleach

Could hope ever to make them, and there by his side

Two faces of age and dignity, men like two trees

Of great wisdom and strength; their faces somehow

Like two faces I knew. They talked with Lord, there

Up on the mountain, and spoke there such words

Of knowledge I knew they were both surely prophets of old,

The two greatest yet. And, the Lord like the brightest

Star of the heavens, Moses, Elijah standing beside him,

There where our radiant God shone so loud,

And the wonder and glory of us all being there,

It seemed like the time and the place to all stop

And make, as at Sinai, tents for our meeting there.

Yet the sound of my voice, my eager suggestion,

Bounced off the sky and landed amid

The vacuum of sound in the wind all around us

While a voice from the clouds captured and drowned us:

This is my Son, whom I love. Listen well to Him.

What a sound! And the glory of God filled our souls.

Then, gone the voice and the men who’d stood with us; gone,

And the sound of the mountain resounded in silence.

The Lord motioned down the mountain to walk,

And so walk down we did, the solemnity of

The moment and then the Lord’s order to

Speak not of this moment, until he would rise

Up from the dead, consumed all our minds,

As each step we took downwards was a fight with the rocks

And the pain of the silence and loss of that glory,

And, climbing, we wondered and wondered and argued

What it might mean to rise from the dead.

It is finished and the night looms.

The darkness hangs as a cloak above,

Tremulous but not quite dropping,

And together, under cover of light, we take

His still limp bundle of bones (all of them we can see

Through the veil of his skin) and take it down

To the garden where the empty tomb waits:

The best we both yet have to give.

Our peers walk swiftly from the scene,

Ready for a rest so dearly bought, to wash

Their hands and sit inside their houses closed

From his words of shaking mercy:

Father, Forgive them. We knew not then

What we did, when we stood amongst the crowd.

Now we leave them. Now we take our lifeless lord,

A moment, maybe, just too late,

Yet still the best that we can give.

Is it finished? The night looms;

The darkness hangs as a cloak above,

Tremulous, yes, but not quite dropping.

And together, under cover of light,

We take his still limp bundle of bones,

And give the best we have to give:

A garden where his body may wait.

It is finished.

Return to your strongholds, prisoners;

Wait there for your deliverer.

Return to your fortress; raise the ramparts;

Take your positions, curled up in the corner,

Drawbridge raised, not to be lowered any

Time soon. Let the moat surround you; let

Your friends and allies hide deep in their pit

Dug far, far below the troubles of the ground.

There wait: wait in terror, wait in fear,

In thwarted belief, imprisoned

By hope, deferred, now put outside

The drawbridge, with the rubbish and

The taunts of the sunrise. Return

To your strongholds. Hold on

To the skin of your teeth. Hide

And hold strong. There’s

Nothing more to see.

My God my God why

Have you forsaken me my God I

Cry out loud by day by night, I

Cry to you on high while words my

Words grow weak with groaning, cry

Not ceasing and no answer, cry by

Night; I am not silent; I am loud. Why,

My God, why are you silent?

Scorned am I; a worm, no man; I

Shrink to bone; they shake and laugh while

Drawing lots and casting die

Lions tear, the lions tear and open wide

Their blooddripping mouths, and dogs

Surround me, evil dogs; a band

Of man-dogs encircles me;

Down I stare, avert my eye.

Naked I can count all my

Bones like nails; the dogs they bark

And growl around me; feet and hands,

They have all pierced my

Feet and hands while loud they cry

Into the hatred and the blight:

Crucify, crucify.

Another one that belongs slightly earlier in the collection, while I play catch-up with myself. This one should go, as the name probably makes quite clear, at the time when Peter is waiting outside the High Priest’s house.

The Rooster Crows

And the sheep are scattered.

They have all run away.

The wolves have come and

The shepherd stands ready

To battle them, but the sheep,

The sheep are afraid.

There are no sheep now

In the pen; they run

For their lives from the wolves.

They have seen the blood drip from

The wolves’ sharpened teeth.

The shepherd rises, with

His burning heart in hand

To do battle with the wolves and

Their virulent hate. He stands

To defend and defeat. But the sheep:

The sheep have all gone.

You, sheep, have all gone.

All will turn away. All will abandon.

The wolves, thick with the evil of

Their dark intentions, loom.

The shepherd stands alone.