Tell Them

Breaking through the powers of darkness

bursting from the stifling tomb

he slipped into the graveyard garden

to smell the blossomed air.

Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,

that I have journeyed far

into the darkest deeps I’ve been

in nights without a star.

Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,

that fear will flee my light

that though the ground will tremble

and despair will stalk the earth

I hold them firmly by the hand

through terror to new birth.

Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,

the globe and all that’s made

is clasped to God’s great bosom

they must not be afraid

for though they fall an die, he said,

and the black earth wrap them tight

they will know the warmth

of God’s healing hands

in the early morning light.

Tell them, Mary, Jesus said,

smelling the blossomed air,

tell my people to rise with me

to heal the Earth’s despair.

Edwina Gateley,

A Warm Moisty Salty God, 54

Clare of Assisi

Teresa of Avila

Mary of Magdala

Mechtild of Magdeburg