Friday, April 6, 2012

We Dare to Call This Friday Good


T. S. Eliot wrote about this day:
The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood –
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.

A body . . . . . never treated so lovingly in life . . . save in a mother’s arms . . . 
A body alive subjected to torture and such contempt . . . 
gently, even delicately taken down . . .  
A body gentled in death
That was so cruelly treated in life.
A man . . . . . feared to be known in life . . . shunned . . . met only in secret . . . 
Openly, even proudly claimed in death.
A life of poverty
A death of extravagence . . .
 new tomb . . . 
Lavish, excessive burial spices . . . 
How anxious they were . . . we are . . . I am . . . 
to do . . . something 
when there is nothing to be done
There is a time to weep and a time to laugh
a time to mourn and a time to dance
Temptation is ever before us 
to duck the choice
Busy . . . busy we must be . . . 
busy with the business, the busy-ness
of tending dead
He is past caring
but we cannot care . . . we do not dare –
grief large enough to split the earth in two
is too large for this human vessel
But busy . . . that I can do . . . 
I can be
busy getting the tomb 
the best – only the best will do
Busy tending to the body
busy is not too big for me
And there is no room for grief in this
busy-ness of the business of death
The grief, you see, is just too big for me
So on with the busy-ness of the business of it all . . . 
Busyness of thought and mind 
even when the body dares cry out for rest . . . 
Even then I am busy . . . busy remembering . . . a day
was it only yesterday?
A meal with friends . . . 
conversation laden with meaning . . . 
The matzah . . . my body, he said . . . 
Broken
Wine
like blood
poured out
He said
Symbols within symbols 
confusions
time not yet passed
events not yet happened
Remembering
and trying to make sense
of the senseless
But if understanding . . . then what?
No grief?
No grief!  It is too big for me!
Groping for words . . . 
I rest in the poets and greater beings
and
I grieve
It is too big for me . . . this grief
But it must be done
And so . . . sigh and surrender . . . 
It is a time to mourn . . . 
The tomb will wait
Sabbath is coming
Poets be damned!
I am not the child of a lesser god!
My God is as big as the pain in my heart
and it . . . is . . . endless . . . 
And so, Mr. Eliot, yes, thank you very much, 
we do dare call this Friday Good.
And so it is
not ice cream and cotton candy good
not falling in love for the first time good
not last-minute governor’s reprieve and presidential pardon good
but suffering fit to the occasion good
12 step bull shit but true feel-the-feeling, 
knowing I won’t die from the pain good
clinging to a whispered half-heard hardly understood promise good
Good-day-for-a-funeral good
Yes, Mr. Eliot, when friends die
it is right . . .
no . . . 
It is good . . . to cry


1 comment:

  1. Yes, it is good.. that there will be joy in the mourning..Marilyn

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