Stations of the Cross

1. Jesus is condemned to death

 

I am condemned. I have my first

Wish. My first step has been taken.

For this sacrifice I thirst.

 

2. Jesus receives the cross

 

I have received the staggering

weight I've waited for. I know

it is all hatred. I can bear it.

 

3. Jesus falls for the first time beneath the cross

 

I can fall. I fall for Adam;

fall for all before me fallen

from the beginning until now.

 

4. Jesus meets his mother

 

My mother's grief reminds he how

mothers will grieve who have known joy

and given joy to lives they grieve for.

 

5. Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry the cross

 

Dark hands of strangers gently say

we too are human: you are too

however far from friends and home

 

6. Veronica wipes the face of Jesus

 

A little help; only a gesture

from the heart. Her happiness is

she can feel for the unfortunate.

 

7. Jesus falls for the second time beneath the cross

 

Falling again but now for now;

for Romans Jews Barbarians;

for the living world that kills me.

 

8. Jesus consoles the women of Jerusalem

 

If you think it's sad think how

much sadder is indifference

when people stand like staring walls.

 

9. Jesus falls for the third time beneath the cross

 

For all that fall in future falls

from grace from favour from high places

so that falling they may find me.

 

10. Jesus is stripped of his garments

 

Naked is alone as born

or dying; extreme poverty

and the mercy of stone or tree.

 

11. Jesus is nailed to the cross

 

Helping hands and way-worn feet

as if they had no past or future

nailed to this moment, to this wood.

 

12. Jesus dies upon the cross

 

After thirty years of hanging

on the cross of the world I say

(at last I say it) it is finished.

 

13. The body of Jesus is taken down from the cross

 

This you may take possession of

can harm no one can do none good

has suffered everything it could.

 

14. The body of Jesus is laid in the tomb

 

In the last place for the last time;

And yet not lost (of all things you

 

may fear). Find me. Seek and you shall.