Children Of Palm Sunday Poem by Amy Bengtson

Children of Palm Sunday

What sweet faces, the children waving branches!
We honor their clumsy parade.
We rejoice at their presence,
Then turn and scorn their absence.
Where were they last week?
Where will they be next week?
And we forget there is a journey to Jerusalem.

The children come to wave our branches,
To borrow our joy,
To steal a taste of our hope in bread and juice.
They do not come from our homes
But from one parent angry at another,
From a door that has not heard the knock
Of Opportunity, praying for their own Jerusalem.

"Hosanna! " they shout, "Save us! " waving branches
Because they really mean it.
They need saved just as we need saved.
Their hope wavers, and
They dare to enter our sanctuary,
They dare to wave branches for Him,
While we prepare to crucify trespassers in Jerusalem.

O, How we love those children waving branches!
But they are not ours.
Our children are gone, absent.
They will not be coming back to wave.
They waved goodbye, not branches.
Perhaps someday we will welcome resurrection
And these children can return Monday to our Jerusalem.