Lazarus

Wow- almost four years since the last update! I pray you will forgive me yet more poetry, but this one I've had chambered seems especially fitting on Lazarus Saturday during Covid-19:

Lazarus

My Lord, why do you tarry?

Your servant lies upon his bed close to death.

Mary sits beside me weeping

While Martha busies with making 

Ointments and stews.

And is there some sin that delays Your coming?

Might we lack faith in calling You here

When the Gentile knew You could heal from afar?

His servant healed in the very hour of Your speaking.

Might pride have slowed your journey?

The Centurion knew himself to be sinful

And so asked not that You enter under his roof,

Yet we have had You here many times over.

Did Mary sin, breaking the flask

And daring to touch Your feet with her hair?

Other women quailed to touch the hem 

Of Your robe woven of one piece.

Did Martha’s pettiness halt Your step?

Not realizing that Mary chose the needful thing

Until You chided her for her distraction

With the many cares of this World.

My Lord, could you but be here

Surely I would rise from this bed.

But my sight grows dim and I feel myself

Fighting for the breath You so freely gave Adam.

I can faintly hear Mary sobbing

And Martha’s ointments start to 

Smell of Myrhh and heavy spices.

And I feel myself start to feel no more.

My Lord, had You been here,

I would not have died.

In the land of shadows I find myself

And am met by Father Abraham.

Isaac stares at me with doubt.

For at the last hour an angel saved him from death,

Whose father had shown You hospitality but once,

Yet I had You at my house often.

Jacob looks to me with shame in his eyes,

He who wrestled with You until dawn.

Yet I embraced You and offered You drink,

And we spent many long nights talking.

Moses wonders what I had done wrong,

He who could only see You from the back,

While I had many times gazed in Your eyes,

What sin left me abandoned and alone?

Even John seems disheartened,

Holding his head in his hands.

For surely I was Your surest friend,

Are You the One, or should he have sought another?

I turn my face away from them,

My cheeks would burn had I still blood.

And as I begin to despair the ground trembles,

As we hear You call, “Lazarus, come forth!”