EASTER GARDEN

The Tomb.

With a finality beyond death, burial removes all trace of existence. Not enough you walked this earth, but you had to be consumed by it – embedded, implanted, sown in this fertile ground.

The Stone.

Heavy with our morbid fear and sealed with all the arrogance of a fallen humanity, it plays its lonely part.

The Garden.

Undisturbed peace. Mankind’s first (and last) resting place. Here, in the arboreal stillness, as leaves respire and sap cools, Nature, sublimely conscious of the Divine, waits, with expectant patience for its most glorious bud to flower.

The Dawn.

Never since its first creation has the sun appeared with greater humility. On this Day a broken body lives again and holy blood pulses triumphantly through once emptied veins. The Son of God rises to still enclosed darkness and the Stone is rolled away. The Shutter opens for a greater Light to shine.

This final barrier does not and cannot resist the truth of Resurrection. Might and meaning; rite and religion; sight and science ... lose their dominance, though not as gladly as the morning star.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Gardener steps into his bower and is welcomed. Creation beams with joy at the presence of perfect Spring and faithful stems bend in the Spirit’s gentle breeze.

At last, a saddened and subdued humanity approaches, still clothed in unredeemable fear. Woman, first cursed by the Fall, is now First Blessed in this Garden as she walks and talks with her God again ... with great joy, she runs to man with the most favoured fruit of everlasting life … disrobed of fear, innocence is no longer ashamed ...

                                     … and, beneath the displaced Stone lies the bruised and bloodied form of a dying serpent …

© 2011 Graham Oakes.

Mynyddislwyn Male Voice Choir 40th Anniversary Concert Blackwood Miners Institute September 23rd 2010

Written following attending their annual concert and pondering on the link between music and our environment.

Hewn from deep and darkened seams

Of rock and crumbling dusty coal.

Tempered like the rolling steel

from furnace fires of the soul.

Music quivers through the air

In the freedom we now share.

Something binds the working hearts

That beat to toil and agony.

Drawn to share their common bond

In tighter frames of harmony.

Music quivers through the air

In the freedom we now share.

Rising, caged, from deathly deep

Hope shines out from wearied eyes.

Beauty leaps from surfaced hours

And finds response in practised lives.

Music quivers through the air

In the freedom we now share.

Cleaner now the valley’s air

Gone the shafts that sucked earth cold.

Decades since have come and gone

Still we hear the sounds of gold.

Music quivers through the air

In the freedom we now share.

(c) 2010 Graham Oakes

The greenwood , flayed

Composed following some recent sermons on Mary and Joseph.

How great the God

we worship here,

Supreme above all things.

Revealed by words,

inspired and true,

the Holy Spirit brings.

Yet see, he chose to come to earth

not as a Warrior-King.

No, born in low humility,

such is the God we sing.

The virgin finds herself with child

and bears much hurt and shame.

Now her betrothed

must hold his thoughts,

as whispered is his name.

“Oh why should this be my reward,

for all the love I gave?”

The answer comes by angel voice,

“This child is born to save!”

So Joseph trusts

God’s strange command

and leaves the Law alone.

He learns to love a child, not his,

and tends him as his own.

Within this family are found

the wounds of love and grace

as God reveals his sovereign plan

to save our human race.

A carpenter

will teach his son

the worth and way of wood;

but this Son learns a harder way

to bring our world to good.

In echo of young Joseph’s cry

hear Jesus’ anguished prayer,

“O Father, why must this be so,

their scorn I should not bear?”

Deep sorrow

hangs upon the Cross,

and nails hold fast the shame.

As Jesus bleeds his mother weeps;

his Father turns away.

Such Horror,

never has earth known,

as Jesus dies for all.

Such Love,

that gives its all for me

before him I must fall.

The greenwood, flayed

and broken down,

is laid to rest in earth;

but like a seed that’s sown in death

it springs to fruitful birth.

How great the God

we worship here,

Supreme above all things;

the child who grew at Joseph’s side

now reigns as King of Kings.