He Comes: An Easter Poem by Frank Ellsworth Lockwood

(An admittedly pedantic poem by Frank Ellsworth Lockwood, April 5, 2015, revised February 2016)

He comes. Jesus that is.
Every eye shall see him.
Flying as an eagle.
And we shall we behold him
Or so they say ...

He is our objective,
Our long awaited goal:
Is just ro see him 

As He really is.

Son of Man,
Or Son of God,
Or some sort of Being in between,
Much debated Savior 

Of an earlier church he left behind

Yet my own reflections 

Plague my weeping soul.
I look toward the mythical 

Heaven as the goal

And staring back I see
Only a gross image of me.

How can this be?
But I never see Him as he truly is!

None of us do.
His truth hides in harness,
Like a lowly beast of burden,
Plodding in a furrow where others never go.

He serves men with muddy feet
Submerged in Asian beds of rice,

Or buries himself deep in snow

Like a polar bear he sleeps

In caves of ice. 

He treads the sands with camels,
Piled high with spices
That leave us smelling nice,

But at what a hefty price!

He hides in pointed hats
And rides in furl turbans,
Or snuggles down in owl feathers
Or flies no more,

Now a quill in Indian headgear

Or He rides in the dust
In a cowboy hat
Western curled
Vaquero style.

A man who rides white steeds on high,
Who forges four eerie Horsemen,
Inspiring suffering Saint
And fiery Apocalyptic alike.

Yet sadly, this Savior
Seems to know his place
And to understand, to acquiesce.
He is the shield from Good Friday's glare.
A sacrifice made up nice.

In Easter bonnets and bunny baskets.
A protection from the scowling stare …
Of God, but he comes.

Yes he comes.
=
He comes riding on a lowly donkey,
Or on a white, prancing steed
He gallops through the skies,
Forgiving enemies,
Forging alibis.

Or slashing them to pieces
With double-flashing swords.
He feeds them to the birds.
(This is in the Bible too!)

Take your pick:
Any way he is … he comes.
And yet we do not see him
Not as he is.

And until we see him as he is
All things continue as from the beginning.
But wait! There he is in the desert! Or out in a field!
“Believe them not!”

He will come to rescue the world,
Or perhaps he will destroy it.
He is love, or he is hate.
He loves all men equally.
Or all equally he hates.

Oh, he has his special race.
His love knows no boundaries,
And lands he assigns, 

To designated people. 

To others a stone 

To smash the skulls,

Of the luckless babies 

Of foreign idols. 

But he is coming soon, 

Or perhaps, a thousand of years from now.
Regardless: Whoever,
Whatever
You or I imagine him to be:

That is not him!

Ever coming,
Always present
Yet never arriving.
The world awaits him.

Waits breathless
For every eye to open,
And that we all may see Him.
Yet not as we imagined him to be,
But as he is.

They say the Universe groans and yearns
For us to greet him, 

In all his humanity
Or in all his divinity.
Or in all his something else.

It is said that when we see him
We shall be like him.

Like him who always is ever past,

Who is continually Present, 

And always, always, Coming as well.

Purely love, or purely hate.
He is on the way, riding in his chariots
In the sky, and so it shall be when
And if, every eye beholds him ... 

That justice will be due.

Until then: He comes. Parousia. The Presence.

Happy Easter 2015  (Maranatha.)

Edited February 1, 2017

End.------------------------

Notes: (See dictionary.com)

Par·ou·si·a
[puh-roo-zee-uh, -see-uh, pahr-oo-see-uh]

NOUN
1.advent.
2.(lowercase) Platonism. the presence in any thing of the idea after which it was formed.
Source: Dictionary.com

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