David, I think this does work as itself. I wouldn't like to comment on it 
from a doctrinal point of view, but it's certainly very powerful.

A couple of practical queries: II line 4 -- a hyphen I assume between 
forward and led; but what about move and still? If this hyphen's a typo for 
a dash, all well and good; if not, then those two linked words are saying 
something rather big very succinctly, perhaps too succinctly for ready 
comprehension? Also, the first 3 lines of this section are in the perfect 
tense, and the rest of the poem seems to be in the present. This could be an 
error, but you don't usually make that sort of mistake, so I'm left to think 
it's deliberate -- why?

"for a twelfth to come self-slaughtering bride" -- ??? I don't remember 
anything on those lines -- do please elucidate.

I get the impression that you're not talking so much the Last Battle as the 
Last Endurance. Well, who knows what's to come?

Now, is that scowl directed at me?

joanna

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David Bircumshaw" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, May 22, 2006 12:03 PM
Subject: Poem and a Plea and a Scowl


> I'd really welcome constructive criticism and engagement on this.
>
>
> PAROUSIA
> I
>
> Imagine this: a room within, the bounds of voice; a crow
> cries beyond; a clock counts; a hall empty, a hall full.
> A voice
>
> comparing: the sons of Belial like unto the word of denial;
>
> preparing: the children of darkness for the prince of light;
>
> declaring: the advent of Israel from the body of the Nile;
>
> a voice aboom abounds above
> bowed heads of the belov'd.
>
>
> II
>
>
> It dropped from the sky like a stone burning down
> with the Will of Heaven. It consumed the dark lives
>
> tangled around roots of pride. It humbled the high
> and low. On our bent knees we move-still forward-led
>
> towards the Last Day of Days, the First of Ever.
>
>
> III
>
>
> On bended knees towards a You-tree,
> of You twisted
> on the pole of the calendar,
> through a snake-lane we turn,
> bloodied, tilting
> like shadows
> repeating the angles
> of flesh.
>
>
> IV
>
>
> Tell me a history of that saviour who bides
> till the calendar ends in a dancing of flame,
> for a twelfth to come self-slaughtering bride.
>
> Make me accounts of all redemptions denied
> to justice's pawns in the backstreets of time,
> in slave-ships or coal-mines, on all the wrong sides;
> of yesterdays bartered that something might come;
> and faith sold like charity; and like hope decried,
> till the day of atonement by a redeemer who hides.
>
>
> V
>
>
> Twelve is the count of the tribes and signs
> that order the years till the ending of times;
> divided then divided, by the two that parted,
> it numbers in three the brand of the beast
> to the faithful awaiting the bridebed's feast,
> abandoned in Egypt, their rescue unstarted.
>
>
> VI
>
> By Your Whither-tree of winter
> supplicant we count out
> days of a world of waste
> days to a mewling
> new-born calendar, days
> to another
>
> zodiac and zenith
> culminating by degrees
> its constellated eyes.
>