Icon

So – was he then so
Fierce? Those eyes, dark
In the ochre oval of his face
Pin intellect to soul in
A transfixing glance – no
Shrugging that look off in
Complacent evasion.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Ah,
Friend, there were those who
Turned away, but with no
Ease: rather the words weighed
Against the challenge of the light as
Lightly we trod his path.
“Who am I?” he asked
Insistently, denying escape.
An answer? Dangerous,
Wild, challenging, too
Close to know? Lord, we said,
Desperately, and found it so.

©C.M.M.

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Night Watch

Is it here, God, in this garden
where the light wind stirs the leaves
silvered in the hard blue moonlight
– is it here that we must struggle
in the dialogue of self with self?
But the words are hardly spoken
when the vast and swelling ache
– a kind of joy, but of such sharpness
that I gasp, and words are stilled –
of the God so close within me
grows and self is marginalised,
pushed towards the edge of being
so that all I know is Him.
In this sudden fiery knowledge
friends who cannot understand
seem ephemeral and tiny –
Pray, I tell them, watch and pray,
as it comes upon me fiercely
that the end is here, this night,
that the God I carry in me
brooks no shrinking from this goal.
Now my soft palms spread in pleading
look so gentle, feel so dear
and this vulnerable body
breathes and weeps in dread of pain,
till the world turns and the strangers
bring this night watch to its close
and the brother’s kiss of greeting
a last gentle touch of love.

©C.M.M.
I wish I knew how to post this so that the previous post came after it chronologically, but I don’t. It was written during the Maundy Watch last year. (done. KB)

Icon

At this time, I find myself challenged by the Christ we follow. The Icon of Christ the Redeemer by Rublev provides a focus for this challenge.

So – was he then so
Fierce? Those eyes, dark
In the ochre oval of his face
Pin intellect to soul in
A transfixing glance – no
Shrugging that look off in
Complacent evasion.
– Ah,
Friend, there were those who
Turned away, but with no
Ease: rather the words weighed
Against the challenge of the light as
Lightly we trod his path.
“Who am I?” he asked
Insistently, denying escape.
An answer? Dangerous,
Wild, challenging, too
Close to know? Lord, we said,
Desperately, and found it so.

©C.M.M

Just waiting?

‘And is it so, that he will
Come again? Two thousand years,
Friend, is a long wait.
Come, abandon this
Faint creed, and look
With me on the living.
Surely your love is due to
Yonder big-eyed child, the
Stick limbs a mute reproach
To your pious introspection?’

I turn from the prompting of
Contemporary concern,
Consider those who place
The broken bread on life’s table.
Among the thoughtless prayers
I see the truth: Emmaeus just
Around that bend, the
Holy mountain under a council
Clutter, the marked palms
Of a friend. He is
Here, close companion of
Each day, coming
Quietly to my side,
A felt embrace, a slow smile,
Those eyes I scarce dare meet
For the overflowing love
In which I daily drown.

Two thousand years, friend,
Is the long road he has
Journeyed with us as we limp
Powerless to the atom’s halo.

© C.M.M.