The Easter Vigil

The vessel within the vessel of human flesh
Pierced but not hardened by iron transfixed,
Grief and lead-laden from hours of pain unmixed
With comfort, now comfort seeks in her God.

Darkness hiding the Virgin where no darkness dwells,
Morn to come, she mourns in her new son’s home.
Her sole born Son is in a colder place, a tomb
Impersonal keeping Him in stone chains.

Child of her blood spilled His on the world, for the world,
The dark tomb separating heart from heart.
The dark room… and yet something more keeps them apart,
By divine substance alone to be crossed

A great stillness deeper than silence surrounds her,
The iron rending her soul without cease.
And somewhere in all this pain – peace?
For strong arms take her in their loving grasp.

With love, without stealth, hands that were not there before
Reach her cheek: five fingers and a great hole
In the place where sound palms should be. But the whole
Face that looks down to hers no crown’s trace bears.

A light is in the room that glowed not there before
Around the five mars in the flawless frame.
The new-arrived Man kisses her; He calls her name,
The lips that spoke it first again crying:

“Immah!”

Regina coeli laetare, Alleluia!
Quia quem meruisti portare. Alleluia,
Resurrexit sicut dixit, Alleluia!
Ora pro nobis Deum. Alleluia.