Jan Lee Ande

Selected poems from Reliquary

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Lazarus Called from the Cave | Ode to the Avocado | The Annunciation of Francis

Lazarus Called From The Cave

His illness came on slowly over time,
notched teeth chattering,
a certain coldness in the shoulders. 

And the heart too began its thickening,
red walls turned to brown,
blood seeping through fissures and gaps.

The tongue flopped about in its dim box,
words not made into sound
lolling there on that languid muscle.

When the soul slipped through a hole
atop his head, and the stone
was rolled into place, darkness descended. 

Soon worms and maggots found soft flesh
bound within bandages,
and the sockets of his eyes emptied.

Even this rot seemed familiar.
His reek had a certain sweetness.
Far off, the wailing of women rose and fell.

Four days passed in the pleasantries of death.
Then the presence came— whiteness blinding—
and the voice that cried: Rise up.

His bones took back their tendons and tissue,
joints hurried to swing
on their pivots, the pulse struck up its beat.

Fingerbones tapped out blessings, a lopsided
smile was pasted on for the doubting riffraff.
Already another age of oblations had begun.

© Jan Lee Ande 2007