Monday, March 27, 2017

Are You Accustomed to The Cross?

A-Poem-a-Day Until Resurrection Day


Image credit: clipartfest.com


ACCUSTOMED TO THE CROSS

I’m accustomed to the Cross.

I’ve seen it since childhood
gleaming high atop steeples,
crucifixes behind altar rails,
on hospital walls,
on bedroom walls,
depicted in framed masterpieces,
depicted in sculpted masterpieces,
described in written masterpieces,
marking graves in cemeteries,
illustrated in holy books,
affixed to lapels,
tattooed on forearms,
hanging silver and golden
and studded with diamonds
and sapphires from the necks
of men, women, children—
hanging, hanging on my mind.

So accustomed, yet
sometimes it is everywhere
and I don’t see it at all.

Today I see it afresh
sturdy and wooden and terrifying
through Good Friday eyes
that send streams down my cheeks
as blood streams from His wounds.
I shudder,
mindful of the Man
dying upon the beams
and the reason He is there—

Shudder
at the horror of it, Jesus my Lamb,
at the magnitude of it, Jesus my King,
at the love upon it, Jesus my Friend,
and my gratitude for it,
O Blessed Jesus,
my precious Lord and Savior
Who by His Death
and Resurrection
purchased eternal life…for me.

Maude Carolan

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