The Rending - Updated with Hallelujah!

For my Christian friends - Christ is Risen

Easter, for Christians, is our most Holy time; that time when Christ died and rose again on the third day.  

In honour of this most Holy of times, this picture is the one I chose to represent my poem.  However, in a very real sense, this is a poem which can be understood on very, very many levels.  

At the end of the poem, I've added an extraordinary rendition of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah' by Kelly Mooney.  Listening to it, I had goosebumps together with tears in my eyes - quite a combination.

One level (which I like a lot) is the giving over of self to The Lord - as a Christian the rapture of the experience is truly a drain on as well as a spur to one's emotions all in one; another is a process of letting go of people and things which have held one back and the freedom to self which such release brings.  Of course, it could have romantic and physical connotations as well and the ending then has a vastly different meaning.

I've intimately experienced all of these at different times in my life and, although the poem was written specifically for one of the chapters of The Daighacaer - Escape from Mount Vilipend, it remains a valid and universal truth in real life.


The Rending

I have been rent

To the depths of my being

I have been rent

I exist

Within

Yet

Devoid of self

Complete

A tempest of tears

Flowing

To sense

Splendour 

To sense

Fulfilment

In pain

In gloom

In identity

In truth

Power

In sanctity

Sanctity

In power

Release

In all

Alert to

Gossamer rustlings

Fine shiverings

Lightning flashes

A depth of joy

In a flood of light