Adventus

You cannot know what it means to be a baby—

A fresh-wrought being, born and knit of love,

Familiar-featured with your parents’ skins.

You cannot have compassion on the trembling and fear

Of holding perfect life within your hands,

Or understand the weight of innocence,

The awe of recognizing in my flesh

And bone—your face—the crowning of all hope.

The world seeks wealth—or justice. Women weep

For men, and men for power. All this, sought,

Eludes. And we are found alone, unloved,

Unlovely in our prides and politics.

To all this answers, “The Virgin shall conceive;

The Kingdom has been made for such as these;

Forbid them not; you must be born again.”

Yet hope’s not now, not here, nor even you.

Before your babyhood gives way to youth

You will know avarice, gluttony, and sloth;

Growing, how knowledge can distend your soul;

By Grace, learn need, and come to find salvation.

Yet you partake eternal Infancy.

The promise of your face is not a lie:

“For He shall save his people from their sins.”

I will wait for the coming of the Child King.