Bread that fills the soul

Haiku of life

He said, I am bread;

bread that fills the soul. Don’t thirst

or hunger, come!

The leaders complain:

How can he say these things, I

am bread from heaven?

God is doing this,

drawing folk to hear my words;

they shall know God’s life.

Open your eyes, ears,

to learn God’s truth, to receive

God’s life eternal.

Wilderness manna

from God fed hungry people;

but later they died.

Heaven’s living bread

gives eternal life. I am

the bread from heaven.

I am bread. I give

my body; a gift of life

for all humankind.

© Ken Rookes 2021

 

Hungers

To get away from the multitudes

and their expectations
the man called Bread
withdraws to the hills.
 
Having eaten their fill,
the crowd still wants more.
They intend to make him king,
to claim him as their hero-leader;
that he might feed them when they are hungry,  
heal them when they are sick,
and deliver them victory over their enemies.
 
Instead he gives them a handful of words:
crumbs of bread to fill them with hope,
and morsels of love to overcome their fears.
Then he offers them platters
laden with small parcels of his own strange life;
topped with generously with sacrifice.
 
None of these  dishes will prove sufficient
to satisfy the imagined hungers of the crowd.
 

 

 

© Ken Rookes 2015

So also the tongue

So also the tongue

James 3:5-10

The heart is hungry,

the tongue is its servant.

“More, more,” it cries,

even though it has never missed a meal

and knows that the storehouses overflow.

The heart is greedy;

the tongue insists,

“I know what is best

for your well-being.

Trust me, make me your king;

these others are fools.”

The mines thrust deeper

to ravage red earth,

forests are levelled,

while quarries gobble their way

to the horizon and beyond.

The heart is never satisfied.

“More, more!” the tongue shouts

at gargantuan dozers and digging machines;

“Less, less!” the tongue protests against

the people and their taxes.

They are an inconvenience, undeserving;

annoying obstacles to the heart’s

never-ending lusts.

The heart will never have enough,

even as multiple tongues bring

their restless evil workings

to the task.

© Ken Rookes 2012