blood and wonder

Earth still lies heaped upon the graves
of children who too young have died
but who can stand with blameless face
since adam wrecked the world in pride?

and mother eve, without a thought
played god while all her children slept
thus cain in anger murder wrought —
and we our brothers ill have kept

the earth burns dry and floods rain down
but we our faces turn away
to curse the tares by others sown
while darkness steals the light from day

all man’s desire is rusted wire
that poisons as it pricks the skin
now bread is ash, and wine is blood
and all our feasts despoiled by sin

consumed, we rage, with naught to quench
and wander far in fevered pain
for who could heal us, who would ever
welcome us back home again?

so in the dark we wail and mourn
yet in the clutch of suffering
lo, unto us a child is born —
the God-Man and the Servant-King

into our grief He came — a babe! —
the weakest thing the world could stand —
yet tightly wrapped and swaddled safe
He held the whole world in His hand

thus Christmas comes in blood and wonder
for God takes flesh and bones like ours;
then grief’s gloom is ripped asunder,
the dark is pierced by a thousand stars

and now we see through a gleaming glass
the hope that one day bright will be
when night is finally in the past
and morning breaks eternally

The featured image, “Roses and Stone Wall,” is courtesy of Lancia E. Smith and is used with her glad permission for Cultivating.

Amelia Freidline

Amelia M. Freidline lives in the Kansas City suburbs with her parents and a wee terrier named for the tallest mountain in Scotland. She studied journalism at the University of Kansas and has worked as a copy editor in food media throughout her professional career; she has also edited poetry collections for Bandersnatch Books and is an occasional contributor to The Rabbit Room’s poetry Substack. On her own Substack, Dispatches to Jack, she writes about classic literature, classic films, and the other various interests of a nostalgia-riddled anachronist. She’s also a poet, a gardener, a photographer, and a wielder of butter. Amelia has been called a G.K. Chesterton fangirl and the queen of non sequiturs, and if she were a cookie she’d undoubtedly be shortbread. She loves Jesus because He loved her first.

innocenceabroad.com