Immanuel: A Poetic Journey

I don't know exactly how to classify this. Call it a poetic meditation. But it summarizes many a journey my mind has taken.

Can you live and not grow weary of life?
Will not decay or disease rent a beloved from my side?
Shall my child grow cold and silent before my days have gone?
I am no coward, so I tell myself.
At the right time, in the right place
Perhaps even the heroic could leap into action
I do not fear pain, nor flinch at threats.
But at death’s tormenting whispers
I would rather flee to distraction than boldly turn and stand.

A valley of shadow of death indeed.
And who shall shepherd our gropings in the dark?
Who shall be our comfort or guide?
Who shall start the feast?
And for what shall we feast?

I cannot fathom Trinity,
Or omnipotence, or eternity.
They are utterly other;
Beyond all that is common or safe;
A bottomless chasm of unknown.
And I dangle from the precipice in quiet terror.
The call is to come, to surrender, to fall in.
But should I fall?
Will not the fall never end?
Sinking ever deeper,
The terror giving way only to the weariness of no end

Shall I meet the Maker?
The utterly Other One?
Me? Part animal crazed with desires,
Part fiend scheming, manipulating, using,
Part human hating the hateful in me,
Striving for a better self.

I am no mystic
No sparks in spirit and soul
No ecstatic visions of divine Love
God is an ominous cloud of otherness
A terrifying storm of infinite unknown
Shall I give myself to this Shepherd?
And recklessly dive into the abyss?

Now at edge of eternity look and see Nativity
A man, a woman, and a baby.
A baby.
The infinite other, a crying baby
I’ve touched babies, loved babies.
Infinite God I cannot know
But a baby, a child, a man I can know
With an eternal divinity I cannot converse
But my God I can speak to, dare I say it,
As man to man, as brother to brother.

O blessed Nativity
God meets us not on the terrifying horizon of infinity.
He meets us in the here and now,
In flesh and bone,
With cries and laughter.

O blessed Nativity
Omnipotence made helpless
All knowing made knowable
The Untouchable made touchable

O blessed Nativity
God in pursuit
Love incarnated
Man made of Joy

O blessed Nativity
God is with us