Thirst

There’s a girl who should be

climbing trees or riding her bicycle

in the street, not hiding in her

basement, breathing shallow

breaths through cracked lips,

thirsting for a cold drink

drawn from the kitchen sink.

Hers is the ache of days

without relief, throat coated

with the dust of walls crushed

by men in the street, resting

in their trucks, sipping water

out of bottles taken from the shop

where she used to buy sweets.

Her tears have left trails of salt

on her cheeks, drought etched

into her tender skin. Her mother

won’t have to watch her slip away

by degrees, but she also cannot

weep on her behalf or open

her eyes to find a miracle well

sprung up in time to dip a cup

and press it to her daughter’s lips.

Who will weep for her?

Who will speak for her?

The Living Water knows what it is

to be wrung dry by the fury of men

guarding their little kingdoms

with righteous indignation, sitting

on their thrones drinking sour wine

to soothe the throats they’ve shouted

raw with frenzied cries of crucify.

It never entered their minds

that this man they despised

could take the instrument of death

they designed to be the undoing

of his life and work and make from it

a loom on which to mend the fraying

fabric of the world.

They heard his words– “I thirst”--

and scoffed–It’s like we thought,

he’s just a man; if he was God,

he’d save himself, and while he’s

at it, save us all, but they forgot,

God stoops to fill our human form

but is not bound by who we think he

ought to be. While Pilate washed his

hands, Jesus washes his betrayer’s feet.

He weeps for every unmarked grave,

drinks the bitter cup, speaks the words we sometimes think, and gives his spirit up.