Poetry list, Advent
Waiting Room
Advent is a waiting room
in a world where there is
so little room for waiting.
disconnection
on hold
adrift
passive
done unto
…everything that is contrary
to the zeitgeist of
our egocentric gravity
Ignore the diversions of triviality
Listen
Be still
Love and truth and hope speak out
in the mists of prophets
discounted and marginalised – voices
that cut to the bone
of our fragile, arrogant flesh.
We miss the glory,
enchanted by the mirror
of importance and pleasure.
There is a greater joy and purer light
that lies in a different reflection:
we look but we do not see,
we hear but never resonate
with heaven’s promise and
simple treasure.
God is coming – and has come – in
fragility and vulnerability:
it is only in waiting,
in making room –
disarming the defences
of our ambient power –
that we can be free and be found
by the future
born in
Bethlehem.
Veni, veni Emmanuel.
© Neil Thompson 2020