The Baptist's Disciple
by John Schreiber
" . . . or shall we look for another?" -- Matthew 11:2
My grandmother knew his parents--
dry and barren as two stones in the desert when
he burned his way from their aged loins.
He was wild as fire on dry brush,
as harsh as jagged rocks on virgin feet,
yet his words cut to the heart of a throne.
I saw him.
Stale water off the streets
trickled in dark corners
of his stone cell.
A rat squeaked in dirty straw.
He only asked a question,
a favor,
begged by one who could command hundreds.
"I was sure, but
now I don't know.
Ask if he's the one."
A murderer, chained nearby, spit on his neck.
The Baptist sat silent in the wet straw;
cell-bar shadows crossed his black hair.
His head dropped between his knees.
I've stood by that current-straddling man,
his words, like waves, crashing on
the mobs, the priests,
the wordless and the scholars.
I had no honey to sustain him.
We should never have left the wilderness.
Words from the Jordan do not echo in
the acrid air of the Salt Sea.
Beyond this desecration they say blind men
see;
I shall journey there and look.
©1992 John Schreiber
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