Tuesday, January 14, 2020

We awaken as the Beloved (St. Symeon the New Theologian)


We awaken in Christ’s body
as Christ awakens our bodies,
and my poor hand is Christ.  He enters
my foot, and is infinitely me.
                       
I move my hand, and wonderfully
my hand becomes Christ, becomes all of Him
(for God is indivisibly
whole, seamless in His Godhood).
                       
I move my foot, and at once
he appears in a flash of lightening. 
Do my words seem blasphemous? – Then
open your heart to Him
                       
And let yourself receive the one
who is opening to you so deeply.
For if we genuinely love him,
we wake up inside Christ’s body
                       
where all our body, all over,
every most hidden part of it,
is realized in joy as Him,
and He makes us utterly real,
                       
and everything that is hurt, everything
that seemed to us dark, harsh, shameful,
maimed, ugly, irreparably
damaged, is in Him transformed
                       
and recognized as whole, as lovely,
and radiant in His light.
We awaken as the Beloved
in every last part of our body.

--St. Symeon the New Theologian (ca. 949-1022), 
Hymn 15, We Awaken in Christ’s Body
from The Enlightened Heart:  
An Anthology of Sacred Poetry

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