(01/016/2017) Poem: Adam's Time of Sleep

Still from a film reading Genesis 2
ADAM & EVE (THE TRUE STORY)

Today, a poem is shared recalling Citizen Martin Luther King, Jr.  Surely, the legacy of Reverend King began in Father Adam, the inheritance of priesthood and service to a righteous Creator.  The first man was granted an unexpected rest, and perhaps, a vision of family, a sharing of unity and peace, and an image of his sons as life to overspread the earth.  For mankind, the lasting gifts of life all follow some form of death and release (we say, rest, sleep) that signals continuity and the fulfillment of eternal purpose.   There are to be multiple transactions of purchase through sacrifice (Psalms 50:  5, King James Version, KJV).  (See the film from 4thaluvofit @https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xxx7m-1iik&t=423s)

THE GOLDEN ARROW:  Look down from heaven, and behold from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory:  where is thy zeal and thy strength, the sounding of thy bowels and of thy mercies toward me? are they restrained?  Doubtless thou art our father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not:  thou, O LORD, art our father, our redeemer; thy name is from everlasting.  (Isaiah 63:  15-16, King James Version, KJV)

ADAM’s TIME OF SLEEP 
[For Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 2017]

Supposing Adam dreamed
What do you think he saw
new formed, the shafts of time
And vision fearless still

Lives that do not matter?
His own sons wearing chains?
King Cotton and Jim Crow?
Mammon the Oppressor?

There was no darkness then
His mind the lamp light flame
His heart a candle glow
Sleep oozing like an oil

He drifted from command
Surrendering his sense
And body to be made
A new creation two

For names the beasts had come
Yet all as kinds and pairs
Sparking a vague regret
There was no vessel meet

And death would have to be
the tool to bring release
From agonies of fear
unutterable pain

And unnamed loneliness
Seed from the earth could be
Seed in the earth could not
And so must spring from he

A she whose work to sprout
A race of living seed
Bold heirs of breath and grace
An heritage from GOD

Awakening he saw
The one whom he must know
Oneness without sameness
To overspread the earth

It was his Son who came
With miracles of love
To die upon a cross
A testament in blood

Why do you pale or shrink
That other sons dreamed too
Who heard our father’s voice
And spoke sight to the blind

News of new creation
The coming of brief sleep
That we would overcome
That justice would prevail

That the liberty bell
Of life would sound and ring
Divine glory will shine
The Father’s face will beam

Anointed with gladness
His true sons will embrace
Crowned with honor and peace
Free at last, Free at last

Awake clear eyes receive
The earth made new our hope
Black and white together
Eternally alive

Unchanging, so diverse
The family of man
In the full strength of love
To study war no more

©Michael Andrew Williams, 2017.  All rights reserved worldwide.

THE BLACK PHOENIX
Washington, DC