Emmaus

Emmaus
By Jonathan Bennett


We were walking together, close and far,
Still so sad on that after-Sabbath day.
In conversation we talked of these things
As our bare feet disturbed the dusty earth.
The road is often full of travelers
But the strangers still stand out like Gentiles.
So it was with this man who drew up close
Looking like fair Dionysus, the vine.
Ignorant, he was, of all the past week,
And we knew he was not part of The Way.
We told the story of the bloody end
That had been witnessed three days in the past.
Derisively we told him of the tales
We had heard before setting out this morn
That certain of the women had crafted
In league with some of those closest to him.
And then, at the end of these tales, he laughed
As though there was humor in our sorrow.
And, laughing, he said to us awful words:
"Did you think it could end another way
That such a man could die of age alone?
Even with your prophets' words in your heart,
Were you surprised at how he met his end?
Did you think lesser love would have sufficed?
Knowing the blood shed on this holy earth,
Would anything less than blood been required?"
So we pondered his words as we walked on
In silence, 'til we came to Emmaus
Where the stranger wanted to pass on by.
But even had come and he was a guest
Whom we begged to come and abide with us.
At table we dined and felt hearts lifted,
By the guest or his words we cannot say.
And at the appointed time he took bread,
And held it to Heaven as he blessed it,
And before our eyes he broke it for us.
We saw then the ram caught in the thicket,
Moses' serpent in the desert held high.
We saw One anointed before all time
Bearing wounds beneath the crown on His head.
We did not know or do not remember
When He left us sitting at the table
But that Bread continues to sustain us.