I, Zechariah

I, Zechariah

Broken are the stones, 

torn is the curtain,  

charred is the timber. 

Rain sings in the gutters, 

and on unpinned hinges 

the gates swing free. 

How the city has fallen! 

How the angels have vanished! 

Bereft is the land, 

desolate the earth, 

emptied of those faithful to the Lord. 

Bright were their faces; 

sweet were their songs of sacrifice. 

Who now gathers on the Mount? 

Only the dead, 

marked by war and plague, 

scarred by flood and drought. 

Spoilers come and go; 

they strip the gold, 

they bury the silver. 

I, Zechariah, am Jerusalem's last man. 

No favour from God do I seek; 

no answer comes from above. 

Did horse and rider never exist? 

Yet surely sea and shore closed 

over our pursuers. 

Now Leviathan commands the deep, 

the waters severed 

from heaven’s horizon. 

I face the ruins, 

darkened images 

in the full light of sight. 

I see it all, piled high, ever higher, 

a singular, mounting catastrophe. 

I am at the edge of my knowing. 

I see it all, yet cannot remain: 

a wind from paradise blows cold, 

and I am driven backward 

into the future.