Easter Day: an Aubade

the sun is on the rise

The Lord is Risen! He is risen indeed Alleluia!

Here is an Easter poem, which takes the form of an Aubade, a traditional form, set as a dialogue between lovers and the break of day. I have taken a genre of secular love poetry and set it in a new, spiritually resonant key, imagining a dialogue between Christ and the Soul. This poem is from ‘After Prayer’ my collection with Canterbury Press that came out in 2019. As the poem is also a dialogue between bride and groom, Maggie, my wife, has kindly read the bride’s part on the recording.. Please feel free to make use of my poems in church services and to copy and share them. If you can mention the book from which they are taken that would be great.

As usual you can hear the poem by clicking on the title or the ‘play’ button if it appears

Aubade

And are you sleeping still my love?

The sun is on the rise,

A gentle west wind lifts the leaves,

And songbirds fill the skies.

I closed my eyes in sorrow love,

My heart as cold as stone,

And thought, as darkness covered me,

That I would lie alone.

 

I closed my eyes in weariness,

I closed my eyes in pain,

And never thought I should be called

To open them again.

But you were not alone my love,

Your weariness was mine,

I brought a light into the dark

That you might see it shine.

I too endured the deadly cold

That chilled us to the bone,

That I might warm the sepulchre

And roll away the stone.

Awaken now to life my love,

Arise alive and free,

Shake off the sleep of death my love,

And come away with me.

And she has risen from her bed

And held her arms out wide

And touched his wounded hands and heart

And gone to be his bride.