A Poem for Holy Tuesday:
The Twelve are Alive in Me.
There are days when it feels
as though all the Twelve
live in this poor disciple’s heart.
For, depending on the moment’s mystery
each has his place, and his preaching
is heard in my soul.
Peter is present,
a rock and foundation stone
thrice cleft by betrayal
and cleansed by tears at
cockcrow,
but fitting fully now nonetheless,
this rough fisherman of grace,
overawed at Love that does not depart
in the presence of sin,
or even self satisfied importance,
but teaches patiently
through the impetuosity
of one who would,
build tents to tame heaven
on a hill,
or swing a leg over the side
to begin the water walk of wonder
until storm tossed seas
recall a quavering heart to the lesson of humility
and later call “Quo Vadis?”
to One whose way he follows to
an upside down end.
O yes.
Peter is present in me.
Andrew beckons too,
the announcer of the Lord.
First called and first to call others.
“Come!”
he cries in me, “I have found Him!”
And this is the life of Andrew in me
finding and losing and finding again;
only to lose again
so that I may call others to
the finding in their turn,
and in that struggle to perhaps
at the last, find all that I have longed for
and sought in every teacher;
the One from whom all knowledge comes,
the One who is the Wisdom of the Ages,
the Lamb walking wild towards His
Paschal place while saying all the while
“Come and See…”
“Come and See…”
O yes. Andrew is present in me.
The Sons of Thunder have their place in me,
brothers both and twice blessed
James and John; lions of the Lord,
tamed slowly into Apostles of
mercy and love.
They shine the light
on all unreconciled in me,
all that is yet to yield
to the gentleness of grace,
transforming fire into fire,
light into light, they smoulder within
until finally alight, the mystic flame
burns away my blindness
and gives the eagle’s eye,
the pilgrim’s staff,
to see and walk the way
beyond the way
of this world
Matthew dwells here too.
Tax Collector, Publican,
who yet holds the priestly name
too in his heart, even in his broken days.
Forgiven his compromise
with the world and called clean
from the heart of horror
by One who sudden stands unbidden
in the midst of the unclean place
to cleanse and call.
His story told me to hope
that I too could be called,
not once only, but daily
from the hard taxation
of sin’s slavery
and its distractions to become
a living Gospel of His grace,
evangelising all in exultation
over mercy found, not once only,
but many times,
where even the tale of my betrayals
becomes a blessed gate to grace
for all who hear.
O yes. Matthew is present in me.
Philip and Bartholomew,
those brothers of the road
and companions on the way
are found in me.
Spirit led preachers and questioners too,
seeking wisdom’s light and imparting
wisdom’s blessings all in the power of
the Word.
In their pain they preached
and fulfilled their longing
to see with their own eyes,
and touch with their own hands.
They teach the lesson of being open to Angels
met upon the road in all the disguises
of grace; stepping lightly and not long upon the earth
they dance across deserts
and invite me to flow freely in faith
O yes. Philip and Bartholomew are present in me.
Thomas too is here,
sometimes still appearing as
Didymus the Doubter;
needing the touch of truth,
the gaping wound that proves Love’s
labour, birthing blessedness in blindness.
Yet also, and more often
he in me affirms faith and its freedom
describing divinity in mystery
and Lordship in light
touching presence, yes
by becoming the very vessel
in which is seen and heard
the One who is the face
of the Father.
O yes. Thomas is present in me.
Three come forward now
Each with their own share
Of me, in me, with me,
Simon, James and Jude
Of the first two named
I owe the allegiance of the east,
for into the sun rise they walked
their way of faith together
once healed of the heaviness
of seeming loss and ruin on Calvary’s Cross.
In its sign they bought with their blood too
the blessing of a harvest
still to be reaped, not just in distant lands
but in this my soul, that lies too often in darkness
and yearns for resurrection dawn.
Of the third what can I say
but that his gift is hope, perhaps
the greatest grace of all save love,
but can love be kindled
save at hope’s hearth?
He too lived his hope unto the gates of Heaven
where hope fades into faith’s fulfilment
and where I pray each day these noble three
may yet bring me and all I love safely home.
O yes. Simon, James and Jude are present in me.
And yes…
There is a Judas place
in which I am the betrayer,
whose faith is so frail
it cannot imagine a mercy
wide enough for me,
and hurtles instead headlong
through temptation’s tumult
to bestow a kiss,
by which the silver coin of self
turns to doubt’s dust
in an unknowing dawn, a mere second away from resurrection
May I be saved from it by this sacred knowing that
O yes; Judas is present in me.
But there is too a blessedness in me,
though not of me,
that kindles faith and hope and love
even in the face of my own weary weakness,
and calls me yet, as they were called
from out the ordinary occupation of the day to know
that these Apostles, all alive in me,
are spokes of one great wheel of love,
that turns the stars and drives the sun across the sky
and pours upon us the uncreated light by which we see the light!
Known to those twelve first as Rabbi, then as Christ, and finally as Lord,
He lights my way, loves me and all that is
into the blessing of being
and asks me now, as then he asked all twelve, and asks now you,
“Will you not come and see?”
O yes. He is present in me.
(an older one today but one that feels right as the Gospel of Holy Tuesday today encounters the responses of the Apostles to the prediction by Jesus of His betrayal.)
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