sweet savior, enraged

savoir sweet in clothing white,
with perfect eyes and tear-stained cheeks,
i know you not like i used to.

when i was a child, you beckoned to me “come”,
and into the colored pages with scenes tender and warm i ran,
hoping to find you;
did i find you?

or did i find a version of you,
with a voice i gave you,
and a personality i desired,
that fit into the perfect creases of the smile you always had?

affable and brave,
genial and civil,
you were.

enraged and wild,
you were not.
furious and uncontrollable,
did not fit you.

but who then is this man,
garments unfurling,
hair bristling,
teeth flashing,
voice booming,
upsetting the quiet in my mind?

he entered uninvited,
and was furious at what he found.

the tables full of money,
the magazines and computer screens,
he cast down and out.

the junkies and thieves,
the drunkards and the whores,
he commanded to leave.

my house was full of beauty,
undisturbed,
until he disturbed it.

my rooms were full of pleasure,
unquenchable,
until he quenched it.

my mind was full of happiness,
unattainable,
until he attained it.

savoir sorrowed, in clothing torn,
with raging eyes and blood-stained cheeks,
i know you not like i used to.

bright and morning star,
who birthed the cosmos,
is somehow birthed in me.

madman prophet,
cast from the temple of God,
is somehow cast into me.

son of God,
torn apart on a sinner’s cross,
has somehow torn apart me.

“Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
He was despised and rejected by mankind,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.”