Poetry

Resurrection 19

The place was empty, those old rocky halls

Contained no thing; like Roman Gnaeus Pompey

Who cleared a path toward the Holy of Holies

And went inside, I found the place was empty.

There stood the most loved of the disciples

As I explained in the preceding chapter

Who then instructed me, thus: ‘I was one

Who knew Christ Jesus first, but as the Dane,

‘Kierkegaard, said, therein lies no advantage.

Although we spoke and heard him at first hand

And saw him act and understood his language

It was still hard for me to understand

The eternal world which was his only message.

For the eternal world cannot be learned.

His miracles, his speeches and his death

Make nothing happen if you have no faith.

‘Eternity cannot be brought about

Inside what Heidegger called the Dasein

Except by faith and purity of heart.

Do you have faith that Jesus was God’s son?

What makes us special is that, at the start

We set the Church up when our guide had gone.

We wrote the story down in our books

And made the church which you call Orthodox

‘Which teaches this. But you can take or leave

And have no faith; dispute and deny Christ,

Like people did when he was still alive.’

He smiled and put his right hand on his breast.

I heard, and I was longing for the grave

Seeing the emptiness. ‘Is this a test?’

I said, ‘Is this the afterlife that I deserve?

I am depressed and that without reserve

‘I have no money, and I am afraid

My family is gone, I am without hope

My cares are heavy they annoy my head.

For quite a while I’ve wanted to escape

I am too old to take another road

And worry constantly and cannot cope

With failure of responsibility

And unemployment. What will become of me

‘When I have left my children and my wife

With nothing but my debts and my absence?

I dread the morning of this afterlife

It started out so promising, but since

Some time has passed it is like the previous life

And just the same. I thought there might be kings

And service, being useful, making money

I need an occupation, there aren’t any.

‘A king has no ambition and no greed

He rules with justice, he protects the weak

Nothing can move his judgement from the good

He tells the truth and approves of the meek

Prohibits the denial of our God

Or of the holiest things such as the psyche.

Where is the king, because I want to work?

I do not want to live.’ Just so I spoke.

Like someone at a protest on the street

I threw myself down cross legged on the floor.

‘You haven’t understood Christ’s meaning yet.

Your faith is a faculty, a kind of power.

It is at work but it is not quite right.

The eternal life is active and aware

When that potential faith is aimed toward

The king of this kingdom.’ That was his word.

And I continued: ‘I’m a suicide

I’m ruined, I am at a near death state

My failures hurt me in heaven as they did

When I was living. It is desperate.

This isn’t the paradise that I wanted.

In the English church, as I remember it

In London’s Abbey, Admiral Nelson lies

Beneath a black marble sarcophagus

‘The tomb was made for Cardinal Wolsey

But went unused until our national saviour

Required its use when he had died at sea.

And other folk art relics, and moreover

That’s where I want to spend eternity.

Not here. Here is no hope. Now I discover

I have to lose my children and fall in

To poverty, is that the way it’s’ done?’

So there I was tested by dark and ice

And not by fire and light as I expected.

It was so dark and mental and loveless

But I was not so stupid. I reflected

That passions and affections and the loss

And shame of things half done and half neglected

Were natural and that this was a test

To prove me in my faith in what is best.

‘You wanted,’ St John said after a while,

To have success and fortune and to be

Like Horace who wrote in that mixed up style

Of satire where he espoused the middle way

And lived and died just like an animal,

He who was almost Christ’s contemporary

Comfortable and powerful in Rome

With small desires and comfortably numb.

‘The Church’s task is to squash these ideals

That root inside the heart demonically.’

And I: ‘Today I’m conscious of my loss.’

Then he: ‘Don’t miss the opportunity

To let go of that self which still relies

On faith in wrong things. Chose eternity.

Eternal life can’t be inspired by things.

Not even God himself by your side brings

‘The hopelessness which gives birth to true faith

If you believe in God, all will be well.’

Across the long trajectory and path

That I have followed, that you have heard tell,

The world’s destruction and its aftermath,

I had insisted on my right to feel

Some love for this, and some hatred for that

Still worried about my actions and my fate.

‘I am in so much danger,’ I whispered

And my instructor answered: ‘Do not fear.

The nature of our trials is not so hard

I saw my friend and lord feeling despair;

When he was on the Cross he was afraid.

Just one leap more in this great adventure

To disown everything except your faith

In our true king, and serve him.’ Here endeth.