When it’s Our Turn to Knock....

You

Holy Immigrant,

How many times

Have you suffered this thankless journey -

Should we, by now,

even from here,

at the furthest shore of Paradise, should we not see

Your Path worn all too clear?

Do the birds not mourn,

that strange scar

now struck

across the very scalp of Eden?

Deeper Greens there

Given way to pale earth,

humbled by Your Precious Footfall.

And there -

where the Garden now

parts forever,

having pushed aside your Perfect Blooms

from 10,000 promising departures.

Or here,

where You've stepped wide

The Potters

Dirt

lest a single tear

renew that shameful clay -

How many times have You

set

that sweet scent at your back,

As the Sacred Wilds

Sway the angel songs

praying your swift return,

begging you,

please,

please

let a lost cause be lost.

Yet time and again

you set off

through the badlands where

salt wives still stare

backwards

towards

some ghostly city -

And on

past the bloody stone

that fell

from Cain's trembling hand -

The jagged hilltop

where you advised an Egyptian

Renegade

on proper social etiquette.

Finally,

to our stoney edge -

Where. Again.

You call,

perhaps this time as an orphan child

with blood in her hair,

fine dust still clinging

that once made bricks

and home

Or maybe an old man,

bent

and naked,

shivering in the cold and

glow of our lamps.

But you have never,

not once

found us waiting,

always walled in by our bricks

and our lies -

fat and pleased,

well contented with your absence.

How high,

these gates of ours we've built-

anchored deep

in our piety -

the shameful locks of iron and pride,

impenetrable, even by you.

Now, as always,

this wall -

standing too high

to overcome its shadow.

And look,

Look how our fear spreads

Just as far

as our hatred will grow -

Now cast

like a sea of nothing

from one

blank horizon

to the next.

Yet you somehow

always journey forward

Always towards

Hope.

With Promise at your back

like a southern wind

Maybe this time

YOU say,

They'll remember.

But we never do - Just the gifts

you've placed

before our haughty watchman.

And Knowing Yourself

unwelcome,

what more could You do?

a few small tokens -

signs

of your Love

The flesh of

Your Flesh -

blood

of Your Blood -

too humble, I suppose,

to remind us,

once

you even left us

Our very creation