Teaching in the Temple

a poem for Holy Week

Thank you, Sadducees—
you men who tried to trick my Lord.
Thank you for asking your little
winding question
about the resurrection.
For my Lord's answer
is the sweetest honey on my lips.
On days I'm bound in fear,
I read his lovely words again:
God is not God of the dead,
but Lord of all the living.
For all do live to Him:
Jacob, Isaac, Abraham,
and all those starry children.
Even they could taste its sweetness;
beauty of this truth.
Teacher, said they, many words
now cut down to a few:
You have spoken well.
I read it in the long dark hours,
and in the bright light of the dawn,
in the noontime sun
and in the evening's lowering dusk.
Death is nothing, nothing, nothing
not even there at all,
nothing to the one who lives,
my Lord and mighty God.

###