Holy is the Name

We train our tongues to shape round syllables,

Dusty with time and fresh with new day’s thought,

Bearing the weight of all we want to mean,

The blazed communication which we sought.

We train our tongues, we train our minds and hearts,

To think and feel what our small words contain,

To never colour in outside the lines,

And never own our secret doubts’ slow stain.

We train our tongues, but ah! our tongues stay mute,

Our chatter falls to silence in this place –

This nameless place, our senses cannot hold,

Where light unmeasured shines on our tears’ trace.

So now our trained tongues falter from all speech,

This is more real than anything we say.

And words would but constrict the majesty

Of glory’s finest touch, its least display.

And yet, and yet, and yet … you are the Word

God speaking forth himself, his self, disclosed;

Spoken into our whirling, wordy world,

And light and life and truth are interposed.

You are the Word who spoke, and what was not

Became. Potent impossibility

Danced into being at your utterance

And was, and at your saying, so shall be.

And thus our chattering echoes silent fall

Before your silence; knowing that your voice

Undoes all death, brings justice to the earth,

And stars and moons and planets shall rejoice.