magnificent defeat

I always loved a parade

But today I stand

Surrounded by the flotsam 

Torn cloaks and beaten branches

Dust and rocks

and the empty echoes of excited shouts

Hooray! We had cried

Here he comes!  He is on his way!

The miracle man!

The one!

Here's the one who will set things straight.... VOTE FOR HIM!

A vote for him is a vote for Jewish values!

He'll be tough on our enemies!

We shouted

Danced

And generally made fools of ourselves

For what?  A scruffy guy from the sticks

Riding on a baby donkey, for God's sake!

 

He smiled gently

and simply moved down the road

down the road into confrontation

rejection

betrayal

into the shadows

 

Lord I am confused!

I thought I knew what you were about O God

and now I am confused

I am less sure about everything

About you.  About what you stand for and how you work

About myself, who I am, and who I am called to be!

 

So I stand in the dust

and gaze after one small figure

as it moves through the dust

toward the darkness

 

dazed and confused

I wonder

 

Perhaps it is time to quit trying to figure it out

and just follow

just follow

down that road

into the hungering dark

into that magnificent defeat