Occasional Impressions

The Gemini Poets

Mass of Maundy Thursday

Here is the edge, the end
Of the world, here are the mountains
And the smooth sea, and afterwards
The howling gulf, the dragon
Shifting in his sleep.

Today we gather on the mountain
Under the scorching sun, to see him pass
(His step wrinkles the standing sea),
Dancing Upon the mountain as he goes
Treading the vintage with his bloodstained feet,
How beautiful upon the mountains,
Mountain of spices, under the apple tree, my love,
And casting grain behend him as he goes,

Casting his corpse behind him as he goes
John Barley corn upon the stone,
And blackening in the heat, for he
Has fallen on the outer scarp,
And roused the hungry dragon, see!
The flesh dissolving in the sun.

Caught in the nomansland hysteria of despair,
We parody his falling dance
In savage and desirous mockery, only
We find we cannot fall with him.
But tipsy with his vintage, know
His seed has rooted us and see!
The Son dissolving in our flesh.

Oh root of God and tree of man
And sun that floods away the sky...

Cup us to catch your falling light
To warm us in tomorrow's night.
rdw - mar 1972

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