Some of you know that our son, Ryan, recently underwent surgery for thyroid cancer. It was on Easter Sunday as he sat beside me in the pew that I wrote this poem.
It is here, in church
I realize
That push has come
To shove
I sit here beside my son,
My strong manchild,
His neck transversed by that hateful wound
And harboring all those rampant covert cells
That lurk and leer
At the flesh
Of my flesh
I”‘m thinking about
“Only-begotten son.”
We sing together, a cappella.
His bass is threadbare:
And then one day
I”‘ll cross that river
I”‘ll fight life”‘s final
War with
Pain
And I want the river
I want the crossing
But I hate the war
And am undone by knowing
That I have made a crossing already
I have overtaken numbness
At the very thought
Of his pain
(c) 2007 Latayne C. Scott
Being a Christian author means being a proxy - for the benefit of another and…
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This is beautiful . . . I especially love the verse that says:
"But I hate the war
And am undone by knowing
That I have made a crossing already"
Your words here do what the TS Elliot essay (in the above post) speaks of: They say what almost can't be said.