Dust-Stirred Hope: Lazarus

“Your dead shall live, their corpses shall rise.

O dwellers in the dust, awake and sing for joy!

For your dew is a radiant dew,

and the earth will give birth to those long dead.”

— Isaiah 26:19

I remember the silence—

how thick it lay

on my tongue,

in my bones.

The hush of Sheol,

not cruel,

but final.

Then—

his voice.

Not thunder,

not trumpet,

but my name

wrapped in command

and compassion.

I came forth—

still tangled in linen,

still dizzy from death.

Alive.

Now I hear

he too has walked

through the veil.

Pierced, buried,

and somehow

risen.

And this scroll verse

returns to me:

"Your dead shall live—"

yes, I did.

"Their bodies shall rise—"

mine did.

But not forever.

Not yet.

I know this body—

spared once—

will fall again.

The dust will reclaim me.

My bones will rest

a second time.

Yet something has shifted.

What waits at the end of days

has broken into now.

The age to come

has cracked open time.

He rose.

Not just for a moment,

but forever.

And if he lives,

then we shall live.

If he shattered the tomb,

then death itself

has been dealt

a death blow.

No longer a wall—

but a door.

No longer the end—

but a passage.

Let those who dwell in the dust

wake up and shout for joy.

For he lives.

And I—

once dead, still mortal—

believe.

-Swales, 2025

Artwork: 'The Raising of Lazarus', Shannon Roman