Your limbs are ladder
From sky to sheet,
Night has but one vision,
Two eyes we meet,
In this making bed,
Like rain we shudder
And sun is undead,
Reborn with another,
What vows we take,
Whisper's lip unlocked,
Voyage of sea breaths,
Slip of creation knocked.
The theme of a ladder to heaven is often used by the Early Church. Saint Irenaeus in the 2nd century describes the Christian Church as the "ladder of ascent to God".
In the 3rd century, Origen explains that there are two ladders in the life of a Christian, the ascetic ladder that the soul climbs on the earth, by way of—and resulting in—an increase in virtue, and the soul's travel after death, climbing up the heavens towards the light of God.