What joke is this which heav’n sees fit to play?
From iron sword at night which brought rebuke,
a virtue - courage - stoked too far was sheathed.
But yet at flame the coward rose foretold?

Can help his look but linger in the soul?

How deep it stings: the sin, the fault, the fear
with which Sophia hath become my Eve,
yet brings with her no respite from the ache
when touched:
                            a sign divine which ought give hope.

Now hope concedes to pain and guilted sighs.
In darkness and the chaos of this night,
He mocks with heinous cries, “END IT! END IT!”

A slight hurt smile, the fool has gone too far,
and called to mind some phrase which love once spoke.

So I with John leave naked from the scene,
stripped bare of key and promises once giv’n.
Tiberias shall greet a worm for fish,
a maggot born to feed the dust. And yet
with soft resolve, “I will be, I will be.”