What Cannot Return

We live on the scraps of Eden.

Life — a tragic miracle,

an echo of

a deeper symphony.

The fruit is rationed.

Water tastes like metal.

Joy comes thin —

a brittle leaf

in winter wind.

The trees are silent.

The ground yields only

to sweat.

Behind us,

the flaming sword

still burns.

There is no way back.

Time does not reverse.

So we go on —

with spit,

sweat,

blood,

semen,

and shit.

East of Eden,

we make children.

We make war.

We make myths

to cradle our ache.

We bruise.

We hunger.

We weep.

We forget

what light

once felt like.

And then —

the Word

became flesh.

Entered our mess,

our skin,

our stink.

Not above it —

within it.

Within us.

He wore our hunger.

He carried our spit

and sorrow.

The divine put on dirt —

so dust

might rise

divine.

And even here —

in claw,

in cry,

in cold —

love takes root.

Not pure.

Not easy.

But real.

Meaning chisels itself

from stone.

We build

a kind of home

in ruin.

We carry

a flicker

of the garden

inside us —

still burning.

And sometimes,

in the dark,

it lights a way

toward hope.

And slowly —

stone by stone,

flesh to flame —

all things

are being gathered

and will be gathered

back to love.

Even the dust

will shine.

Physicality,

transfigured.

Every tear

wiped away.

— Rev’d Jon Swales

Artwork:

Edwin Bashfied

Angel with the Flaming Sword (1890)