\u201cHe is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.\u201d (Matthew 28:6) \u00a0The Garden Tomb, in East Jerusalem. \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
A few days ago, in remarks that I shared with a group at the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem, I shared a couple of poems that I find meaningful. \u00a0I\u2019ve shared each of them more than once here on this blog, but think that I\u2019ll do so yet again:<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
1.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
I\u2019m very fond of the excellent second-tier English poet A. E. Housman (d. 1936), who, along with writing such works as \u201cTo an athlete dying young,\u201d from\u00a0A Shropshire Lad<\/em>, was a distinguished\u00a0classicist at the University of Cambridge. \u00a0The melancholy mood of many of his poems speaks to me. \u00a0I\u2019ve even made a minor pilgrimage to his grave.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\nHousman was an atheist, and sometimes a hostile one. \u00a0But he had moments of yearning. \u00a0This poem, entitled \u201cEaster Hymn,\u201d captures those feelings of longing for a belief that, in the end, he simply couldn\u2019t muster:<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
If in that Syrian garden, ages slain,<\/span><\/strong>
\nYou sleep, and know not you are dead in vain,<\/span><\/strong>
\nNor even in dreams behold how dark and bright<\/span><\/strong>
\nAscends in smoke and fire by day and night<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe hate you died to quench and could but fan,<\/span><\/strong>
\nSleep well and see no morning, son of man.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nBut if, the grave rent and the stone rolled by,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAt the right hand of majesty on high<\/span><\/strong>
\nYou sit, and sitting so remember yet<\/span><\/strong>
\nYour tears, your agony and bloody sweat,<\/span><\/strong>
\nYour cross and passion and the life you gave,<\/span><\/strong>
\nBow hither out of heaven and see and save.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Please bear in mind that, historically and classically, Syria included not only the contemporary nation that bears that name, but the areas today known as Jordan, Israel, and Lebanon. \u00a0So Jerusalem can, justly, be termed \u201cSyrian\u201d in a certain sense. \u00a0(It certainly wasn\u2019t in Israel when Housman wrote, because modern Israel didn\u2019t yet exist.)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
2.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Then I shared \u201cSeven Stanzas at Easter,\u201d by the late Pulitzer-Prize-winning American novelist John Updike (d. 2009):<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Make no mistake: if he rose at all<\/span><\/strong>
\n It was as His body;<\/span><\/strong>
\n If the cell\u2019s dissolution did not reverse, the molecule reknit,<\/span><\/strong>
\n The amino acids rekindle,<\/span><\/strong>
\n The Church will fall.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nIt was not as the flowers,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Each soft spring recurrent;<\/span><\/strong>
\n It was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled eyes of the<\/span><\/strong>
\n Eleven apostles;<\/span><\/strong>
\n It was as His flesh; ours.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nThe same hinged thumbs and toes<\/span><\/strong>
\n The same valved heart<\/span><\/strong>
\n That-pierced-died, withered, paused, and then regathered<\/span><\/strong>
\n Out of enduring Might<\/span><\/strong>
\n New strength to enclose.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nLet us not mock God with metaphor,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Analogy, sidestepping, transcendence,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the faded<\/span><\/strong>
\n Credulity of earlier ages:<\/span><\/strong>
\n Let us walk through the door.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nThe stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Not a stone in a story,<\/span><\/strong>
\n But the vast rock of materiality that in the slow grinding of<\/span><\/strong>
\n Time will eclipse for each of us<\/span><\/strong>
\n The wide light of day.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nAnd if we have an angel at the tomb,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Make it a real angel,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Weighty with Max Planck\u2019s quanta, vivid with hair, opaque in<\/span><\/strong>
\n The dawn light, robed in real linen<\/span><\/strong>
\n Spun on a definite loom.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nLet us not seek to make it less monstrous,<\/span><\/strong>
\n For our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,<\/span><\/strong>
\n Lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are embarrassed<\/span><\/strong>
\n By the miracle,<\/span><\/strong>
\n And crushed by remonstrance.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Posted from Paris, France<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 A few days ago, in remarks that I shared with a group at the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem, I shared a couple of poems that I find meaningful. \u00a0I\u2019ve shared each of them more than once here on this blog, but think that I\u2019ll do so yet again: \u00a0 1. \u00a0 I\u2019m very […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a>