The stories of Holy Week and Easter season carry such rich imagery and always seem to lend themselves to deep metaphorical reflection and visioning, for me. One doesn’t have to name oneself as Christian to draw from this deep well of living metaphor, or to see how it uncannily, without fail, reflects the troubled, complex, both/and state of (my) humanity and the world in these quarantine days – darkness and light, grief and grace, loss and abundance, co-existing all together, backlit by hope rising.
Something in me continues to love keeping the Easter vigil, especially in those deep wild still hours of the night, and even though we couldn’t keep the Easter vigil at our church this year, we had the invitation to keep vigil at home. And so I purposed to keep vigil through the night til the morning, through those deep wild still hours … Prepared candles and incense and a place to sit in silence and a place to write as the Spirit so moved.
And the Spirit so moved, in this way! This is a wrenching, raw cry from the deepest places of my heart and soul, bowed in grief, lifted in grace – for me and for the world, hope for me and you and the world.I hadn’t necessarily intended to share this poem publicly, because it’s so nakedly personal – these are some of my deepest aches, vanities, and longings, core wounds and spiritual struggles. The old patterns, old pains, that keep rising up as I keep peeling layers upon layers, seeking deeper healing, truer, freer living … this quarantine Easter season has brought so much to the surface, for me, for us all, for our world …
Yet it seems right to be open, if there is anything that may speak to other hearts, too.
With much love and hope, I bow and share this from the Spirit with you, beloved ones!
Rise, Leave the Graveclothes
It is time to leave the tomb
I have been there a while
Not alive but dead to life deepened
dead not alive
not alive, not risen
not living nor rising
In a tomb
I have been
It is time to arise
leave this tomb
return no more
to this place
Rise, leave the graveclothes behind
seal the tomb
return no more
to this death
Resentment, toxic envy
bitterness of seeing others
richly clothed in honor and influence
you have sought
but feel nakedly unknown
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave the graveclothes
Seal this tomb
free, walk in light
clothed new
Praise and honor craved
from some, stories
and needs carried
unmet, not to be met
still worn, worn to tatters
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave the graveclothes
Seal this tomb
free, walk in light
clothed new
Desires to have your words
known, esteemed, quoted
to carry weight in the world
and ring wild into the Night
This want to be a thought leader
a spirit leader
a standard bearer of belovedness
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave the graveclothes
Seal this tomb
free, walk in light
clothed new
Understanding, a mirror held to you
you may fancy yourself
prophet or poet
mystic or mother to the world
and wish this seen
but these, small ego longings
they are
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave the graveclothes
Seal this tomb
free, walk in light
clothed new
The trappings of ego, social norms
the pressure to be doing
creating, producing
squeezed by deadening belief
you are only relevant
in doing and known to be
doing
done, I am
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave ego’s graveclothes
seal its tomb
Free, walk in light
clothed new
Enfleshed grace –
Don’t you yet know –
you are Relevant
by being Risen
awake, alive
enlivened, enfleshed
Grace
Comparisons – of your children
to the shiny-ness of others’
children, achievers, actively known
much praised
names held in golden esteem
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
(and these – graveclothes
your children themselves
are not wearing
because you have well taught
them not to put them on
so why must you!)
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise, leave these graveclothes
seal the tomb
free, walk in light clothed
Awake, alive, eyes clear
to see light embodied in your children
as they are
love them into their authentic
best selves
and do not offer them graveclothes, of any sort
to wear
or model for them graveclothes
Model for them the rising
and the leaving
of the graveclothes
the sealing of the tomb
the walking free, in light
Comparisons, self-condemnations
spirit-quenching judgments
robbing joy and justice
In blindness, holding onto
unlit candles
light of others unseen, unhonored
your own light unlit
un-risen, un-enfleshed
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
Rise! Leave the graveclothes
all graveclothes
seal the tomb
Free! Walk in light, clothed
awake and alive
Risen
Risen, enfleshed Grace
dry bones enlivened
clothed in
Light
Rise!
Leave the graveclothes
of this past life
(death)
of what was thought normal
but was
death
These graveclothes, they are
but tatters and they stink
Shake them free
dust, they disintegrate
shake the dust free
rise and walk
Return no more
to this death
Risen, return to life
Things that have been thought normal in this world
scarcity, lack, greed
busyness and exhaustion
body and soul and earth depletion
unkindness and heart blindness
violence and war
inequity and injustice
Graveclothes
nothing but graveclothes
that are and belong
to death
Let us all rise, leave these graveclothes
Seal the tombs we have made
for one another,
seal them
return to them no more
Free, let us walk in light clothed
together Risen