Sun and Ice

With edges sharp

as your eye’s knife,

it stands, suspicious

of the rite,

the callow, beg-eyed, leg-thrummed calf,

the wet, thin-fleeced, wobbly lamb.

The chasuble

drapes the rail.

The crow opens his wintry beak.

Where’s the blood that saves the mark?

Somewhere under Easter week.

Their sacrifice

will not suffice.

The heart is made

of sun and ice.

Oh, how I hoped how we might sing! How

wrong I was. It’s like a tick,

that sticks to the skin, or jerks the eye.

The square will not

the circle win,

though roses open

in her hand

and thorns stigmata the winter land.

The altar stands

between taut oaks.

We ’wait the god

and kneel in mud.

Slap the drum.

Pluck the dance.

Eat the blood.

Horses, prance!

Bring in the callow, leg-thrummed calf,

bring here the thin-fleeced, wobbly lamb.

The eyes stare

and staring, blind.

Drink the heart

of human kind.

Love is not a fallow field.

It ripens, or it does not yield.

The sacrifice

will not suffice.

The heart is made

of sun and ice.