Acts I i-xi

The ends of the earth:
autumn leaves under February ice,
the crump of snow.

The freeholds wait for their protector.
Each roof, scree-patch, dark-arched
viaduct, each kitchen vowel.

Beloved of God:
the soles of his feet
the last that we saw.

Eh, big man. Toammy.
Watch yersel with that poappy.
That’s Celtic over there.
Dirty bastarts.

Instructed to stay,
Jerusalem-bound,
awaiting a gift –
our Christening robes.

The city paints itself orange,
says nothing bad will happen.
Stretches its hands to the ceiling,
touches its hair, shoulders,
turns to show its profile.
Goosebumps in the cool room.

This is the cruelty and the kindness,
every dropped stitch and sacrifice,
the chance to save ourselves from squalor.

Here a man preserves his marriage
and relives forever
the unrealised moment,
the unique, vivid, lost, exotic moment,
and here too, inextricable,
is the saving grace,
the root of every time our species
ever turned its hand
to unity, the surge of love
that drives us past ourselves.

The year turns and we approach our Jerusalem
kneeling, learning our length of street,
forgetting, getting to our feet.
The city is a buried village of tunnels.
We are poor and this is our Jerusalem.

Wide brown river,
autumn leaves under February ice,
the ends of the earth.