WHAT THE WISE MEN BROUGHT
Foretellings
are double-faced,
mixing
chance and cause
fact with belief.
Suppose
they sought Herod --
the
star beckons ambiguously;
they’re
aliens, unused to
local
customs, lacking immigrant
aid,
court interpreters. Perhaps
they
just stopped for a roadside
emergency,
unaware
of
the death decree: heralds
streamed
from the palace
blaring
the message in brass
and
plumed helmets; the cloaked
gravid
flight towards an ill-sited birth.
Let's say that’s the meaning:
orthodox
gift-wrap is tinsel.
What’s
holy is kindness --
the
task then and now
to
show up.
Version first published in Rat's Ass Review, Summer 2020