Thirty Pieces, Price of Lamb

Tell me again, Dear friend,

Shall we run down to the river? 

Cast off our sandals and our sins

And hold our breath, chests still like

The dying, as the waters

Come lapping over our heads? 

I have been washed here before and,

No doubt, shall my body be washed here again

Will you smile at me then like you do now, 

Eyes squinted, eyes closed as we swim down,

Down as if we are swallowed, body and blood,

Before gasping back up. I am not yet a fish.

I’m not yet above breath.

Tell me again, Dear friend,

Shall we steal the great planks of

Wood from the Carpenter’s workbench?

I hope we do so again and again.

And will you take my hand in your silver fingers

As mother pulls the Carpenter’s nails from

Out my palm. Where, tender as a lamb,

In the middle, it shall scar before it fades. 

A bull’s eye upon the altar, yours to sacrifice. 

Now tell me again, Dear friend,

Do you look at my palm, my thorny brow,

That your hand once held so well,

As you hammer in the first nail,

Like you are building a house that I shall never 

Know, that has no room or bed for me?

Or do you know it as if it was your own? 

Do you draw the first blood 

From the scar left there before?

And tell me again, dear friend,

Will this be the last time that

We steal the big planks of

My Father’s workbench 

(the one not in heaven,

No hallow to His name)

And drag it, up on our shoulders, 

Out, out, out beyond the walls.