Emmaus

Cleopas, it was he who stirred
The dying coals to flame.
Did his words not burn within you
As they always did and (now we know)
Always will? Shadows of our grief
Veiled him from our sight, but his words
Glowed in the oncoming night, and we forgot
The dark, the wild dogs barking in the sunset.
His presence was like the wind he described
To Nicodemus; it touches one as though
It were a brother. We know where
He came from, but oh, Cleopas,
Where does he wander now?
Through fields of evening light turning
Rows of grain beyond these brown hills
Dry of rain? See there, in that tree flaming
With the evening’s last light, a dove cries
Softly by the road we take.