Lawrence Hall
mhall46184@aol.com
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com
A Sequence of Poems for Holy Week
(Some of these were submitted in past
years)
Holy Thursday 2017
On this Maundatum Thursday falls a bomb
From the belly of a beast, falling, falling
From the Empyrean and through the blue
Past mountaintops and misted valleys deep
And then into the planet’s earthen flanks
Its pulses to repudiate Creation
In vaporizing the structures of life
Into primeval molecules of dust
Because some bad men might be lurking there
On this Maundatum Thursday falls a bomb
Maundy Thursday – Mass
of the Last Supper
“Bare
ruin’d choirs, where late the sweet birds sang”
-Shakespeare
The air is thurified – the incense given
Our Lord upon His birth is fumed at last;
The censer’s chains, clanking like manacles
Offend against the silence at the end of Mass
Supper is concluded; the servants strip
The Table bare of all the Seder service:
Cups, linens, and dishes, leaving in the dark
An Altar bare, prepared for sacrifice
In Gethsemane the flowered air is sweet
But iron-heeled caligae offend the night
6 April
2012, Good Friday
A Night of Fallen Nothingness
The Altar stripped, the
candles dark, the Cross
Concealed behind a purple
shroud, the sun
Mere slantings through an
afternoon of grief
While all the world is
emptied of all hope.
The dead remain, the failing
light withdraws
As do the broken faithful,
silently,
Into a night of fallen
nothingness.
7 April
2012, Holy Saturday
Easter Vigil, Sort Of
A vigil, no, simply quiet
reflection
Minutes before midnight, with
all asleep
Little Liesl-Dog perhaps
dreams of squirrels,
For she has chased and barked
them all the day;
The kittens are disposed with
their mother
After an hour of
kitty-baby-talk,
Adored by all, except by
Calvin-Cat,
That venerable, cranky old
orange hair-ball,
Who resents youthful
intrusion upon
His proper role as object of
worship.
All the house settles in for
the spring night,
Anticipating Easter, early
Mass,
And then the appropriately pagan
Merriments of chocolates and
colored eggs
And children with baskets
squealing for more
As children should, in the
springtime of life.
Easter, 2014
Christos Voskrese!
For William Tod Mixson
The world is unusually quiet this dawn
With fading stars withdrawing in good grace
And drowsy, dreaming sunflowers,
dewy-drooped,
Their golden crowns all motionless and
still,
Stand patiently in their ordered garden
rows,
Almost as if they wait for lazy bees
To wake and work, and so begin the day.
A solitary swallow sweeps the sky;
An early finch proclaims his leafy seat
While Old Kashtanka limps around the yard
Snuffling the boundaries on her morning
patrol.
Then wide-yawning Mikhail, happily
barefoot,
A lump of bread for nibbling in one hand,
A birch switch swishing menace in the other
Appears, and whistles up his father’s cows:
“Hey!
Alina, and Antonina! Up!
Up, up, Diana and Dominika!
You, too, Varvara and Valentina!
Pashka is here, and dawn, and spring, and
life!”
And they are not reluctant then to rise
From sweet and grassy beds, with udders
full,
Cow-gossip-lowing to the dairy barn.
Anastasia lights the ikon lamp
And crosses herself as her mother taught.
She’ll brew the tea, the strong black
wake-up tea,
And think about that naughty, handsome Yuri
Who winked at her during the Liturgy
On the holiest midnight of the year.
O pray that watchful Father did not see!
Breakfast will be merry, an echo-feast
Of last night’s eggs, pysanky, sausage,
kulich.
And Mother will pack Babushka’s basket,
Because only a mother can do that right
When Father Vasily arrived last night
In a limping Lada haloed in smoke,
The men put out their cigarettes and helped
With every precious vestment, cope, and
chain,
For old Saint Basil’s has not its own
priest,
Not since the Czar, and Seraphim-Diveyevo
From
time to time, for weddings, holy days,
Funerals,
supplies the needs of the parish,
Often
with Father Vasily (whose mother
Begins
most conversations with “My son,
The
priest.…”), much to the amusement of all.
Voices
fell, temperatures fell, darkness fell
And
stars hovered low over the silent fields,
Dark
larches, parking lots, and tractor sheds.
Inside
the lightless church the priest began
The
ancient prayers of desolate emptiness
To
which the faithful whispered in reply,
Unworthy
mourners at the Garden tomb,
Spiraling
deeper and deeper in grief
Until
that Word, by Saint Mary Magdalene
Revealed,
with candles, hymns, and midnight bells
Spoke
light and life to poor but hopeful souls.
The world is unusually quiet this dawn;
The sun is new-lamb warm upon creation,
For Pascha gently rests upon the earth,
This holy Russia, whose martyrs and saints
Enlighten the nations through their witness
of faith,
Mercy, blessings, penance, and prayer
eternal
Now rising with a resurrection hymn,
And even needful chores are liturgies:
“Christos
Voskrese – Christ is risen indeed!”
And Old Kashtanka limps around the yard
Snuffling the boundaries on her morning
patrol.
