This poem is a reflection. You are invited to read it slowly, allowing it to imprint on you, a true image. Let it icon on your heart, Jesus, alive in the soul of all, whatever faith, creed or nation they belong to.
Easter Icons
By Marie Casamento SGS
A woman sits in an eastern barred room,
imprisoned in her own house, imprisoned for her belief in equality.
She ponders the question,
asked long ago,
“And who, who is my neighbour?”
On the Nullarbor, in Washington, in Russie, in the Ukraine and Mandalay, Go, go!
is the answer. Take the road, go!
Fire, flood,
steadily sweeps across the land,
Wraps around fields, paddocks, pig pens and barns alike.
Life is suffocated, paralysed, spent
Quelled only by the softening release of tears.
Jesus, too, recalls hens gathering chickens as his TEARS gently break homeland soil.
Remnants of produce, and life left in this place
lie on isolated islands of soil,
spotted throughout
the sandy silted pastures,
of a southern inland sea. Fish float belly up in their thousands.
Not a DONKEY’S bray breaks the silence.
Way, way up along the track,
between Jerusalem and Jericho,
masses of rubble lie,
lie fallow as moaning grief
catches in barren throats. Silence, emptiness.
Not a PALM frond breaks the horizon.
The quest to find an upper room
lies flattened in debris and dust.
A few women sweep furtively
to create, in a space left by the bombs,
a shelter for their children.
A meagre MEAL breaks no bread today in spilt blood.
In the forecourt of earth’s white houses
hands wring in ink,
splattered across blank pages.
Signed consent as witnessed deeds,
no longer hold the will of the people.
Who will be RELEASED to US? Will homes of ice, deserted spaces, perhaps both?
A lone man, battered, bruised, weak
trips aimlessly along war-torn corridors,
pushing amid seas of buffeted people;
Moving forward, always on command, “go north, go south
Wait, wait outside the gates”; A heavy cross he carries on his back.
As he passes, a babe’s swaddling clothes catch ICON-ified tears of weeping mothers.
At the crest of the hill,
the view of desolation,
from north and south, east and west
imprints on the soul of all,
Futility.
Earth opens, thunder rages, lightning strikes,
temples, mosques, churches in RUINS.
The view on the hilltop spans space, time, colour, creed.
in the lands below,
wells run dry, fires rage,
floods, cyclones, pandemic, pestilence return.
A cry is heard worldwide
“I thirst.” “We thirst.” “I THIRST!”
In response, a world sends truckloads of food and water
Hope lifts.
Energy moves people forward. They run.
The thought of fresh water,
is enough to slake an inner thirst, but …
But still, the gates hold back the trucks. “WE THIRST!”
Outside the gates in eastern lands,
tombs of earth, cover a people,
shuddering the earth itself to cry out. Screams pierce the vacuum.
Golden temples tremble and fall.
Monks scatter amongst stunned soldiers, order is upset.
“Open the border!” Collapsed bridges bar the way, “WHO will roll away the stone?”
Nations respond,
The far east and far north arrive; Order is reversed. Order is upset.
First responders, grasp and tug at the earth, bare handed.
The man-made stones are large, heavy, cumbersome.
Undaunted internationally, people arrive with aid, bushmasters, earth movers, food.
Wingless ANGELS dare to break open and sit beside the dead, even the alien work in tandem.
The Old Order has gone.
North, South, East, West, Heaven and Earth meet,
Muslim, Christian, Jew, Buddhist,
Orthodox and atheist sit down together
Come sit, please cast the net on the other side.
“There is FISH, enough for all. Take and eat. Be satisfied.”
“It is I. I am risen indeed.”
From North to South,
from East to West,
From Jerusalem to Jericho,
On the road to Mandalay,
Go, go do the same, that is the answer to your question.
“I am Risen indeed! Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia.”
