Marathon - a prayer poem by Wil Triggs
Run away from the voice
you’ve never run from before,
suddenly aware of your own body,
embarrassed, proud, a little ashamed.
Run to see all the stars,
so many across the sky,
try to count them and consider
how the family mysteriously grows.
Run and give a barren laugh
Run with ineloquence of doubt
Slow of tongue
Slow of speech.
Run across the riverbed
as chariots chase behind
charging, warriors running alongside
toward the crashing waters and our freedom.
Run remembering Egyptian leeks
Forgetting the making of bricks,
Longing for the foody foods,
Blind to bread falling from the sky.
Run away from giants
In the land or Philistine,
striking rock for water
when simple words would do.
Run into the whale’s gut
to temple worlds and idol gods,
Into Gomer’s unworthy arms
and out onto beachy sands.
Run on sands of desert heat
the day burning like an oven
the path with no sounds
and silence like deafening night.
Run to the place the angels sang;
abandon your flocks and run.
See the baby born among sheep
and cow, the Lamb among the lambs.
Run to see the man who heals,
The one who multiplies a lunch
Into lunches, who heals and commands
“Come forth” as grave clothes fall away.
Run and spread the Lazarus news
that someone has come to free
us from Rome and religion
and maybe even death itself.
Run alongside the humble parade
on the road of branches and coats,
Save us we cry and plea
and praise at the same time.
Run away from police and courts.
Afraid, seeing leaders of church and state
arrest, condemn, beat and kill
The One we hoped would change it all.
Run from the shame of warming fires
where you did not know
the one you know, the one
Who knows and loves you still.
Run away from the skull place,
from the nightmare of the universe,
the death of the bread of life,
the solid rock behind the cold stone door.
Run like Mary to tell the others,
how it was not the gardener she saw
but, could it really be, Rabonni,
making paths on which to run.
Run on Emmaus roads with burning hearts
and ears hearing every word explained,
transformed to tell of news so good,
unimaginable, right and true.
Run from stones of Stephen’s fall
To places far away from home
To the Ninevah-Narnia lands
To places you’ve never known.
Run to the cities by the sea,
To villages on mountaintops,
To valleys where strangers live
To deserts, caves and jungles far.
Run with sprains, fractures, breaks
With throbbing pains or subtle aches
With tears and sweat,
To do things we cannot do.
Run without the garments of false gods
Weighing us down. Innovations, Traditions,
The January resolution we label true and right
Family, work, Luddite or trends of tech.
Run to magicians, sellers of silk,
Persecutors, governors, families and foes
Farmers, bakers, artists, neighbors, kings
Wealthiest and poorest, beggers all.
Run to another year, another time,
To rescue the miners lost underground,
Listening for the tapping cry for help,
Pipes pumping down the oxygen of grace.
Run on the Spirit wings
Scattering love like seed on all grounds
Abiding in the greatest of these
Whispering love like bridegroom and bride.
Run to tell of the living life alive
Of the unforgiveable forgiven
Of the forgotten fathers scrolls found
Of the parabolic pathway golden paved.
Run to the shoulders of the shepherd,
The thick mane of the lion,
The wooly warm slaughtered lamb,
The race finisher, scars and all,
The Man who makes the outdoor stove
Then catches and cooks and bids us eat
The shimmering breakfast He’s cooked for us all
Under the TREE beside the RIVER of LIFE.