Our Reckoning

The Waves by Virginia Woolf

p. 7: "... and the grey cloth became barred with thick strokes moving, one after another, beneath the surface, following each other, pursuing each other, perpetually."

p. 94: "... I, who desire above all things to be taken to the arms with love, an alien, external. I, who would wish to feel close over me the protective waves of..."

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You say that Your waves are perpetual,

the strokes everlasting.

Yet I feel if I left today

my heart at a final cold

You would let me go.

I, crawling on the floor

Squirming, crawling, straining

with the last of me

please

close over me the protective waves of carrying,

of an extended arm.

Yet You leave me to crawl up

straining to walk

no crutches offered

no carrying

no arm extended.

Your waves are ice on my face.

Squirming, crawling, straining

You'll leave me groveling

unless I crawl up on my own.

You don't offer Your hand.

You don't carry me on Your back.

You deny me crutches I need to walk.

You say Your waves are perpetual,

Your strokes everlasting,

I thought I knew You

but who are You?

You say You want to close over me protective waves,

but you don't.

Why will not even my heart at its freezing point move you?

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I let my own Son cry for desertion on the cross.

We endured for love.

You do not understand,

But stay in Me.