Chitra Ganesh, How to Assemble a Flying Car (detail), 2018, linocut on tan BFK Rives. Courtesy of the artist & Durham Press.
Those I Love Are Subjected Once More to a Farcical Trial
for Susan, Liz, Steve and Phil
Reverberations, motions of spirit—
only monks or mystics are attentive.
Beneath the comicalities, the curt court,
the rancor of death-head judges—
go deep, deeper.
Soul stirs like the faint flutter
of Lazarus’ fingers’ start
—the merest intent of birth—
to lift the gauzy shroud from face.
(Caravaggio, that volatile genius—but
Christ thought of it first)—
Lazarus longs to breathe. He clutches thin air,
though a moment ago, thought of breath
slept forever,
dead bones
stacked back to back, all odds
against life.
Now face to face.
And ourselves stirred, who a moment past
dared not imagine
—shall we risk it?—the Real Thing.
Daniel Berrigan is a Jesuit priest and author of more than fifty books of poetry and prose. He is deeply involved in the global peace movement and a contributing editor of Sojourners, a Christian social justice magazine. (updated 6/2010)
“A Conversation with Daniel Berrigan” by Mark Wagner appeared in AGNI 43.