I.

She was heavy,
But we men stood beside her
Lifting her up in procession.

We marched a while,
No one recalling how long
The passing from hand to hand;
One shoulder on the left was pressed
And forgetting due to stress,
From above,
And in yearning,
The other pressing from below.
Engrossed and drowsy from a heavy dinner,
Were some, and
Some,
A lack of rest that night…

It seemed odd to me:
Was I wrong to assume
Time would stop at these heavy moments,
To expect rain,
To comfort the sun
Its shyness adding weight to the air:
As if the suppliant clouds would ask for the bodies
Of fallen Argives, and lay themselves
By the knees of Theseus.

II.

Hallelujah, She is risen,
Is risen from the dead,
Nay, not risen,
But the treacherous harvester of souls
Has gained her image,
Hung and pierced on her Cross
And saved us all.

Awake, arisen,
In dreams the divine word manifests.
Forsaken by young and old,
An emblem of a past
None cares to recall:
Suspended by a wire
Reinforced by the same vigor
That wakes all mortals from their long slumbers.
Tended by wrinkled maids,
Daughters of the Fates,
Their strands of hair white as the
foam of the Persian sea.

Not even the water could lift her now,
Nor the air may swivel the locks of hair
Islanded now, nor even dare,
Let her shiver in the cold as it
Caresses her grainy scalp,
Her trunk soon to be pumped with exhaust,
Like loose rubber
Sheathing her stolid bones.

III.

The plates pile in the basin,
The women merry,
The house drowned in the laughter of children,
One son abroad, one within,
Mourning.
One jolly,
With racket sifting the air
Of discolored and worn tennis balls,
Not yet caught unawares
That the branch that hung shriveling,
Fell prostrate to the cold shove of the wind.

The younger
In silence, he stood up from his slumped stupor,
Scarce a memory of the last droplets
That strengthened his resolved figure
From breasts that nursed him
As it did hundreds before him,
Brethren of the milk
Nourished from flowers atop each mountain,
As each mountain flower was seeded,
Till she nursed her last and ceased
In name and deed.

In silence, he stood
To serve himself a plate of rice and a
Burnt fish,
Its scales not properly removed,
As if scaled with haste
To commence a dubious celebration,
The fat lining its tissues had seeped away
To the shores of Knossos,
A thin film trapping little sunlight
Left to reach the bay of
Halicarnassus.

IV.

She was there that night,
She awoke me from my fevered rest:
Hark you the gospel,
I am risen, I am risen,
Bring back the pale,
Smooth my creases,
Rub me with the balm of the fish,
Comb my hair with the bones of the Murex fish,
Dress me with my green gown,
Iron it,
Do not leave it discolored and dilapidated,
Brush the dust away,
Let the Moroccan incense drive away from
The house the putrefaction.
Bring to me my scriptures,
Or take them away!
The pages will obstruct the gestures my fingers
Conduct,
The lips move nonetheless with whatever
Powers I am granted, whatever I retain,
Let me thumb my rosary,
One bead, two,
Let me lose count, ...
Oh, do not press me too hard
But pull me from that
Tight sepulcher,
For I shall rise,
I shall rise.
I told you I am risen from my sleep,
Now young men, stalwarts of the Eastern Walls,
Stand tall and carry me to my bed
For me to lay rest again.

Surra,
March, 2024.