“Where, O death, is your victory?
    Where, O death, is your sting?”

- 1 Corinthians 15:55

__


O Lord, sanctify this:

today,
as huddled mourners wept themselves dry

--a grove of blackened birch that grows
around a solemn shadow, a vine upon bone--

as pressed toes crumbled through mausoleum floor

--a great Kingdom that has gone mute
for the buzzing of bees, mindless murmur of wind--

as overcast eyes stabbed blindly

--the billowing stone masts in an ocean of grass
betrayed no signs of the carnage--

in accordance with the Scriptures
life delivered the fatal blow

and death--

death was alive
and throbbed within me.