Vibrating with life, the tender green needle dives
From blue-sky canopy, atop redwood womb
Abandoning brightness of glory for dust
And beatific worship for earthly gloom
Where great Alexanders follow each another
A circle of death brings piercing pain
Feeding sour bleeding malignancy
And endless rack of travail again, again

Which hovers behind all actions of power
And goblets of wine, fine garments of purple
So the blood-red newborn goes gently to war.

Suddenly, bells jingle abrupt interruption
Dashing through eons of ice, ages of winter
An end to despair? Of selfish consumption?
Has the Just One arrived? The climax begun?
This newborn sparkle still diving through space
Flashing glimmers of purpose and destiny
Through dank moldy air, through dusty grey curtains
Soaring with hope, gliding through tense atmosphere

Give life, speak justice against criminal horror
To oppressor or good enough family man
As the blood-red newborn goes gently to war.

O can it be? a genuine true possibility?
To glimpse the belly-laugh of history?
This lion-lamb blend of divinity
Piercing garbage man hooker of slavery
With transforming comfort, death-killing purpose
Thou thirst-quenching river, nourishing mountain
Touch anyone dead, touch anything broken
Laugh at the wise, the best or worst politician

Leaven of life for all flesh and all cultures
Suffering hero in victory story
The blood-red newborn went gently to war.

Where do we breathe your invasion of kindness?
But in slice and dice, peel-and-cry sing-alongs
Heard in kitchen and hut among all who believe
Touching eyes and lips with seeing and sweetness
In warm stoney mansions, cold smokey shelters.
The hammer of life pounds our hearts and our limbs,
With cosmic surprise, mysterious beauty
Your light, your shadow grows culture of mercy

For eros for cooking for playing for work
Embracing the cosmos of human endeavor
The blood-red newborn went gently to war.

So what must I do, Thou blood-red arrival?
Receive your intentions, make room, just listen?
Ask, ask for grace, seek beauty for trembling
Yearn like the desert wash waits, waits for rain
Seek surprise intervention, the heart’s liberation
From addiction to mirrors and cancerous I,
And I will discover the glorious Other
Is in me for beauty, for fullness, for joy.

And gazing high in tearful truth and pulsing love,
By glory received and returned … I believe
The blood-red newborn went gently to war.

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Note: This is a poem I wrote this in 2006.