Kolob
There is a star, they said,
near to God's own throne,
that rules both near and far
and governs as its own
the lights both great and small
that shine in heaven's heights,
the children one and all
that beam in endless night.
And every day, they said,
lasts for a thousand years
in which God's children play
with smiles and no tears,
in which a journal's thought
exceeds in wisdom's reach
all things our scribes have taught,
all things our lives can teach.
And from that place, perhaps,
one sees the host of hosts
which sprinkle endless space,
that sea without a coast --
and there the forests old
spread endless and unmarred;
their trunks are trunks of gold,
and every leaf -- a star.
But standing here, I said,
I know a greater thing
than any extant sphere
around which worlds can ring:
the soul that prays with tears
while facing endless loss
and overcomes its fears
to stretch forth on a cross,
and rises up once more,
a lamb upon a throne,
the way, the sheepfold's door,
the knower and the known;
he is the branching vine
and we the grafted stems
that praise with cheerful wine
the endlessness of him.
