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First, because it's appropriate and Eliot will always be my favorite: East Coker by T.S. Eliot.
Second, because I'm in a mildly exhibitionist sort of mood:
(still more or less untitled)
"take this bread" that once was dough,
left behind in darkened spaces, set upon
a culinary catafalque to rise.
No unleavened wafer, this- ours is thick
with yeast and sweet with egg, bound by
floury hands and braided twice
into something more than simple sustenance:
three pieces for the father, the son and
for that greatest ghost; three more for us and
for our virtues, любовь, надежда, вера^.
this is more than bread alone; it is spring
and love and hope renewed; it is redemption, it is faith
"take this wine" and drink of one another,
pour yourselves out in my memory. this is the
cup everlasting; take it and drink, to those
not at the table, to all the empty
spaces we have betrayed. take this cup and
drink for sacrifice and sorrow, for honesty and joy
This is more than wine, it is truth and tragedy all
at once and so much more besides: it is forgiveness,
staining our mouths with blood.
please forgive us our trespasses and
pagan inclinations, forgive the smell
of vinegar and my purple fingers, the color of
eggs that will never hatch (no pysanki, these;
ours is a patchwork of pretty pastels.
we prefer our pastoral slaughter to be
as bloodless as possible); please forgive
our substitute sacrifice of marshmallow peeps
and chocolate bunnies. Forgive these palms
folded beneath your grave and graven image.
Please. Forgive. We know not what we do,
only that it must be done.
we partake of sweetness, of gingerbread
and jam, khulich and chocolate cake that won't
last the day. the bread never lasts, either,
devoured by the loaf until it is no more than
the memory of sweetness on the tongue-
we must wait until next year, when once again
this dough will rise (in a buttered bowl
behind the toaster, covered by a shroud).
Take this bread and eat it.
Do this in memory of me.
---
This seems to have become something of a tradition- every year, I take this poem out on Good Friday and tweak it a little more. Perhaps it will be done by the time I'm thirty; probably not.
^lyubov, nadezhda, vera
Second, because I'm in a mildly exhibitionist sort of mood:
(still more or less untitled)
"take this bread" that once was dough,
left behind in darkened spaces, set upon
a culinary catafalque to rise.
No unleavened wafer, this- ours is thick
with yeast and sweet with egg, bound by
floury hands and braided twice
into something more than simple sustenance:
three pieces for the father, the son and
for that greatest ghost; three more for us and
for our virtues, любовь, надежда, вера^.
this is more than bread alone; it is spring
and love and hope renewed; it is redemption, it is faith
"take this wine" and drink of one another,
pour yourselves out in my memory. this is the
cup everlasting; take it and drink, to those
not at the table, to all the empty
spaces we have betrayed. take this cup and
drink for sacrifice and sorrow, for honesty and joy
This is more than wine, it is truth and tragedy all
at once and so much more besides: it is forgiveness,
staining our mouths with blood.
please forgive us our trespasses and
pagan inclinations, forgive the smell
of vinegar and my purple fingers, the color of
eggs that will never hatch (no pysanki, these;
ours is a patchwork of pretty pastels.
we prefer our pastoral slaughter to be
as bloodless as possible); please forgive
our substitute sacrifice of marshmallow peeps
and chocolate bunnies. Forgive these palms
folded beneath your grave and graven image.
Please. Forgive. We know not what we do,
only that it must be done.
we partake of sweetness, of gingerbread
and jam, khulich and chocolate cake that won't
last the day. the bread never lasts, either,
devoured by the loaf until it is no more than
the memory of sweetness on the tongue-
we must wait until next year, when once again
this dough will rise (in a buttered bowl
behind the toaster, covered by a shroud).
Take this bread and eat it.
Do this in memory of me.
---
This seems to have become something of a tradition- every year, I take this poem out on Good Friday and tweak it a little more. Perhaps it will be done by the time I'm thirty; probably not.
^lyubov, nadezhda, vera