Blood, boils, frogs, hail, came the children’s cries,
and soft silence as they remembered the first born
sons – like me, he thought and will I be recalled?
He watched their faces, joined in the swell, but
shakily. His last feast with his family of meandering
men and wise women before violence and death.
—-
His hands shook as he felt the bite of the lash, as
he dipped the bread in the bitter, sharp herbs, “This
is my body which is given for you.” Eyes in shock
stare at the pieces and ate as asked, while Mary
felt the sharpness of a sword in her chilled heart.
She watched as he tearfully lifted the cup of wine,
—–
Elijah unreturned? No, for he claimed it for their own,
stumbling, stunned silence filled the Upper Room.
‘I will not share this feast with you again.” the words
like blows rained down on their drunken merriment,
like that riven sea, rushing, raining down upon them.
He looked at their old, young faces, he so loved,
—
The children he’d blessed. How would they even
remember this night before tomorrow? A sign he
gives of a promise of forgiveness and grace, into
the gloom he says,“Remember my love. Drink,
the promise, a cup of forgiveness and hope
for all souls, to be sealed with my own blood.”
—
He walked alone with them to Gethsemane. He
carried in his heart the unborn child, the abused,
the oppressed, the violent, the warmonger, the
tyrant, the slaver and the slave, the hypocrites
and the helpless – filling his thoughts til he knelt,
in agony and wept, “Father, your will be done.”
