by Linda Muller

Created on: April 17, 2008

One From Jericho

I am your Zacchaeus
(and you not quite my Christ);
come dine with me.

We shall sit beneath my sycamore
and perhaps salvage the leaves
at our feet. But then you will die,
because you are dust.

You cannot save me.
You did not create heaven,
or Earth,
or me.

I have fallen and you have died,
unable (or unwilling) to protect me.

Could you protect me, were I
widow or orphan?
My wet pleas curve the edge
of your Bible.

Does it open without you now, to tell you
of the king who tore out his own bowels
then threw himself from a cliff
where his people stood waiting
to save him?

But you can't help me,
protect me,
save me.
Everyone else but me.

If you don't love me,
Lie to me then,
while your shadow passes.

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