I have often rippled those waters with tears of frustration,
my whimpers drowned out by cries
Of those fresh to their plight.
The blind, the lame, the paralysed –
We lay there as casualties of a war
in which we'd never agreed to fight.
We gathered in hope,
we lay there in expectation
in fear
in desperation.

And then we heard of his approach.

Was it he that had turned well water into fine wine
at a wedding, a while back?
Hushed rumours of his powers had reached us before,
but I wasn't buying it.
I've seen others like him come and go over the years,
promising it all
but, like us, helpless in the face of brokenness.
Forgive me for not holding my breath
when the whispers started
but I'd rather place my faith in a swirling pool
than in one of God's bearded politicians.

Despite misgivings, I admit to being struck
by this itinerant preacher;
he saw us with different eyes, I swear I could see
a storm of anger brewing
under that compassionate gaze.
Countless hours spent at the water's lip
now blurred to nothing,
and like everyone else, I pleaded with him

for consideration, for mercy
for whatever he could spare.

No-one heard him stoop to ask,
without the cadence of irony
near-mocking words: 'Do you want to get well?'

Does the starving man crave food?
Does the barren woman long to give life?
Who looks upon a helpess cripple and asks callous questions?
Here, we sit and endure,
rejected and degenerate,
awaiting redemption only death brings.

'Well then, get up! Pick up your mat and walk!'

But still I lay there, watching
in wonder, in longing, in jealous rage
as the cripple did just that -
thirty-eight years spread on a mat,
now he stood up and skipped away.

But why not me?
What about the rest of us?

Labels: poetry, submissions