Awake, sleeper,
and Christ will shine on you.
I stand breathing in thick and hanging morning light,
as though the airy motes this morning had been honeyed.
I have heard this time called ‘the golden hour.’
It suits it,
with all its complexes of meaning.
Perhaps my head has been turned by too much or
too little philosophy, but
I think meaning is what this time is all about.
There is an excess of Being here.
I want to go to where the trees suspend
the morning light between their glowing leaves,
put out my hands, all cupped and mortal,
and take,
and taste,
and drink.
Stand there all heady with the taste of glory,
the nectar that is the Word.
This is where I go when I read those lines:
‘Awake, O Sleeper,
and Christ will shine on you”;
or even:
‘Taste and see
that the Lord is good!’
I drink the honeyed sunlight and feel
its warmth work down into my gut,
feel it in my limbs.
I am here and I am alive and I am human and I mean.
Here no thinker or philosophy can nihil me away.
The old Psalmist, clever and wise, the voice of God,
once compared the voice of God,
the Law,
to honey and the mighty sun.
I think I begin to understand why.
And yet
Sweeter is the Word than honey
and the drippings of the honeycomb –
an excess to exceed this morning’s depths.
Day to day may pour out speech
and night to night may pour forth knowledge:
but when these are filled and overflow,
where will the fullness of God be pleased to dwell?
In human hands like the ones I cup,
in skin and ligament and bone.
In blood and flesh and weight of death.
I stop a moment and drain my cup,
and move my hands once more into the light,
and this time look.
If I could see with Father’s eyes,
I would see the nail holes there,
the bloody sign of the most extravagant adoption
there ever was.
The deed to an inheritance of Glory.
Were this tree to come to life,
would it sway its trunk,
its breath all deep and green,
its leaves all cupped and mortal,
and beg of me a blessing?
O Lord!
My rock and my redeemer!
Search my golden breath and know me,
Let me not betray this gifted glory!
The words of my mouth,
the meditation of my heart –
may they be acceptable to your searching sight!
—-
David Fulton ’16 is a Social Studies concentrator living in Adams House and is a staff editor for the Ichthus.