What did we expect after 2000 years?
Angelic choirs, Satchmo on trumpet,
Mozart at the piano, Elvis singing lead?
Waiting for hours on stone steps
Worn smooth by Roman sandals
Stained by Jewish blood,
We could almost see beyond
The Judean Wilderness,
Charlton Heston, his staff outstretched,
The sea parting.
What our jaded eyes saw
Across the span of the Temple Mount
A company of priests,
Robed and phylactyred,
Rushing back and forth
In front of the Western Wall
Blowing shofars, sounding not at all
Like the Trump of God
But rather the squawk-tooting
Of a grade school Kazoo band.
Not one scruffy dove
Landed on anyone's shoulder.
What God saw
Jesus in the Garden,
Sweating drops of blood,
As he prayed for the flesh
That encased the Messiah
And for the souls of all mankind.
Most brutal of deaths, the tomb
The rising again of the Nazarene,
Titus’ destruction of Jerusalem
In crumbled stone, fire and blood.
The Jewish nation over the centuries
In diaspora, ridicule, inquisition
Death camps and crematoriums,
Through it all, keeping Covenant with God
“Next year in Jerusalem,”
Who brought them together
Once again as a nation
Keeping Covenant with Israel
What God expects.
Keep blood Covenant
With my Son,
The Covenant of Calvary
And the empty tomb.
Oh, yes. The tough one,
“Become as little children.”