Suffer the children
I am talking to the archbishop about the letter he just wrote,Resigning his seat after fifteen years, a note he had to write,By canon law, because he grew old in service of the Church,And I get distracted by a drawing that's right in his sight lineNo matter where he turns in his office. You cannot not see it.It's a drawing of him, by a little kid; the kid was maybe five,He says, and I think he had just started kindergarten, and weMet when I came to visit for some reason, and he painted me,And gave it to me real shy, and something about that kid justNailed me. I keep it where I can't miss it. It's about kids. NoMatter what we say it's about, it's about kids. The worst sinsEver committed are against kids. That will never occur again,Not here, not if I have anything to do with it. I owe that littleBoy, I guess. That drawing has kept things clear for ten years.If it's not about kids then it's not first priority. Simple lesson;But we forgot about it for a long time there. Never again, notAs long as I breathe. There's kids and there's everything else.
Yesuah
In the same way He elevated the cup,And gave thanks, and gave it to them,Saying drink ye, all of this, this is Me,Do you understand what I am saying?But they did not, nor were they idiots,Nor are we fools, it's just that the ideaIs huge and new and really hard to eat.That He would be in us, rather than usKneeling and moaning and prostratingTo a Lord, even a lord of the starfields,This was new and confusing. It still is.We were used to worshipping the sun,Then, and a series of bloody overlords,And various incarnations of not-death,But the thought that He was in us, wasUs, that we are the shards of His light,And that the work is to resolder shardsUntil they are again His seamless love;Well, this was revolutionary then, andRemains so. He was murdered once byThe shock of it, but He's no fool either.He slipped Himself into every moment,Every act, every mercy and forgiveness,Every kindness, and so He grows closerTo being born again, in some confusingWay; the