High School Contest Winner
The Paschal Four
I. When in subtle mass I weighed, Latent boughs kicked fleshy drum. Falling circumstances staid The appetite for love and thumb. Patience swaddled in the moons Through clouds about my nebulous form; My origin loved me in monsoons Though I was yet naught but worm. In sphere I was, as sphere I made Tunnels of blood stretched heavenward, Ropes of life were spun and frayed Nightish bastion, quelled in cord. Impelled toward wound, I came in span, My crest opposed the source of weight, Pain my propeller, namesake as man, Did I but inherit the strings of fate. I shivered off my cord and coil; And broke the primal virgin light To live in truth and leave the soil, To regain my immortal sight. II. Fissured promise come into I, Archetype for languid age. My marrow holds my red and sigh, Learns me of woman and my rage. These bones are frames for negatives, Skin mere cover for holy course, Shell shrouds the secret in me lives, Eyes making wine by yeast and force. The kiss of virgin vision lingers As ghost of passion on my void. I feel a message beneath my fingers; Report of life slowly destroyed. Clouds overcast the firmest truth, Countenance ‘round disguised by thought; Yet in my plea, in prayer, in youth, I have found what I have sought. Pain of silence haunts the lash But sores are sweet for seedling faith. My zeal burns with unseen ash; In water, blood, and gall I bathe. III. Then herald my decay, you brood Who hold high your heavy, poisoned heads, Sing psalms of suffering misconstrued As sun his bride horizon weds. Sinful season wraps its joints Around the remnant blood and thought. With ash and dirt, the earth anoints The son which from its loins was wrought. Ascending mounts with broken load Sacrifice upon my stem, History climbs upon the road Him to perish, to salvage them. Shroud covers naught but what is seen And hides mere wooden ritual Like infant love, we all must wean Ourselves from all that is habitual. My soul rejects the hero’s fate Limbs thrown in constellation fast For by thistle’s draw was conquered hate His blood upon the stars is cast. IV. Rejoice! oh son of man and song, To depths the night of love has spread! Greenest shoot has cleansed your wrong In sleep, man is no longer dead. Fugues fly from pipes veiled in my spine, Honey and milk flow through my veins. Promises rise at call divine When only surrender forever reigns. Thrown from sea’s belly, chariots ride, Drivers cloaked in gloried flesh, They leave behind their drowning pride And take their souls to rake and thresh. Glory blinds the trodden one Yet darkness may caress the heart, For only by the love of son Can spring forth the better part. Hallelujah! Cries this stone Blessed with tongue lacked in the crowd Sole is my victory to atone, To shed my sin, to bow aloud.
—Timothy Barr
Timothy Barr, 17, is a senior at Monsignor Bonner High School.
He wrote “The Paschal Four” as a junior and was sponsored by his
English teacher, Mrs. Elizabeth Smith.
