EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the seventh in a series of nine Eucharistic poems by Br. Dain, leading up to Corpus Christi. We hope they will be an inspiration for your prayer and reflection.
You could have chos’n a thousand ways
To stay with timid flock,
To guard, to guide, with us abide,
Protecting, with us walk.
As champion strong or presence vast,
Beyond our simple ken,
Or like a lion, fatherly,
That prowls about his den.
Or maybe like a handsome prince
Who’s followed by his train,
Or as a sage, aloof, recluse,
Approached through endless chain.
Or like a giant, strong and sure,
Whom none would ever dare
To pose a doubt to least command,
If it was just and fair.
You could have stayed in endless forms
Your due respect to reap,
But hid behind the veil of bread,
Your hidden vigil keep.
With arms outstretched, with silent plea,
So we are free to choose
To take or not what Love has bought,
With everything to lose.
This the love your heart here seeks,
A love not forced by fear,
Nor distanced by a vast divide,
But love of friend so near.
Intimate a friend you seek,
Who comes by love that’s pure,
And not by noise or force or gain,
Which many would allure.
A friend that’s true and intimate,
Who comes nigh silently.
This is love for which you yearn:
Humble, self-less, free.
That I may not approach as slave,
You stay in form of bread,
And as one close and intimate,
On you to rest my head.
