It's written in one of my favorite forms - the Sestina. A six stanza poem, each stanza six-lines long. The ending words of each line repeat in each subsequent stanza, and rotate up one line each time. The ending of the poem is a three-line stanza that makes use of the six repeating words in pretty much any order, although I like to use a middle/end framework.
All these rules make the sestina a somewhat difficult and cumbersome form to squeeze a meaning into at times. At the same time, it's easy in that you don't have to rhyme or follow a certain meter.
What I love about the sestina is the circular nature of the poem, which lends itself greatly to discussing life topics, as we all know how life tends to go in cycles or circles.
While this poem still has some rough edges, I figured it could use an airing on this glorious Resurrection Sunday!
Thanks for reading!
In the Garden
“Must Jesus bear the cross alone, and all the world go free?
No there’s a cross for every one, and there’s a cross
for me.”
I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses, And the voice I hear, falling on my ear, The Son of God discloses, And He walks with me, and He talks with me, And He tells me I am His own, and the Joy we share as we tarry there, None other has ever known.
The presence of God once touched this garden,
Precious hours spent as He walked down the path
In the cool of the day. But one day, in shadows,
Two betrayers hid their faces in naked shame;
Once-friends of God, now blushed to speak His name.
Cast out, path to God choked with nettles and thorns.
God’s Son came to earth, knelt on a garden path
Blood fell like tears, while foes came in shadows.
Twice betrayed, friends sleep, run from His shame,
Deny Him to men, fear to speak His name.
So He took on Himself a crown of thorns
While He prayed “Not my will” in the garden.
Heavy on His shoulders, the cross’s shadow
Fell across the earth as He bore our shame.
Friends gone, ashamed to confess His name.
The King, cast out, wore a crown of thorns
To Calvary from Gethsemane ’s
Garden –
The way back to God, a blood-stained Path.
Day became darkness, great with His shame –
Jesus, “King of the Jews,” they mocked His name
Crushing sin pained Him more than the crown of thorns,
As He looked back in time to that day in the garden
Where two sinners stood shamed in Eden
Cast out into death, living under sin’s shadow.
How precious is that Holy Name!
How blessed the blood that fell from those Thorns
How beautiful the Savior who knelt in that Garden
Choosing rather to suffer that sin-laden Path
So I might be hid underneath His Wings’ Shadow
To save me from suffering, sin and Shame
Could I have borne one sharp sting of those Thorns?
Would I have watched with Him in the Garden?
Would I have fled as others away down the Path?
Or hid, denied him, while watching in Shadows?
Can I bear the thought I caused Him such Shame?
Can I be worthy to call on His Name?
He left Eden’s fair Garden
for the Cross of Shame,
Took my crown of Thorns,
took my hell-bound Path,
Hid His Glory in Shadows,
so I could profess His blessed Name.
