The Dove Poem by Reva Kern

When chased out, without returning to the ancient temples,
twisted by the fiery wind that blew from Thabor
The grand Olympians were so miserable
That the grandchildren pulled their golden beards.

During those days of anxiety where the
Surprised earth carried, like a burden, the collapsing skies,
A lone man, standing against destiny
Dared, in their distress, to have the pity of gods.

It was a large forehead, an emperor, a sage
Sitting high on his throne and on his will
stops with his finger a whole century from passing
to give his word of order to the divinity.

Now, a night which marched with its captains,
Had leaned under the weight of the human future
It appeared, at the back of a blurred mist,
An old isolated temple on the side of a street.

An old isolated temple full of doleful faces
One of these dark fragments, a bitter souvenir
Which sleeps beached on the shore of the ages
When the religions lower like the sea.

The doorway crumbled, the rain had gnawed the door;
The whole moon entered through the crevices in the roof
In the middle of the trip, he left his escort
And advanced pensively along the ice-cold walls

The columns of marble at his feet, broken
Strewn everywhere precious cobblestones
Weeds climbed high through the belly of the statues
Storks dreamt on the shoulder of the gods

Sometimes, in the silence, a whir of wings
One understood, far away, like a running shudder
And on the great leaning vanquished faithful forehead,
Phoebe, cold like them, watched them die.

And as he remained there, lost in his thoughts
The depths of the temple saw him break away
With a confused noise of plaintive cadence
A trembling light appearing to walk.

It moved closer sounding on the paving stones
It was an old man who cried on the road
Bent with age, thin, dressed in rags and
Shuffling his sandals
A tiara on his forehead, a lamp in his hand.

He hid under his robe a white dove
The last priest of gods, he brought again
On the altar the last slaughter
And the emperor mourned because his dream was dead!

He cried until day, under that dark arch
You smiled, O Christ, in our blue paradise
Your angels sang on the ivory harps
Your angels shook their six fiery wings!

And with the gloomy firmament offending the distress
Like the edge of a great lake with brilliant billows
In the luminous milk lost by the goddess,
Your crowned martyrs washed their
Bloody feet.

You reign, without division, in the sky and on the land
You cross covering the world and climb up the middle
All before our watch, trembled, up to your mother
Eternally pale to have carried her God.

But you do not know the word of destinies
O you who triumphed near the olympic dead
You see: it is the same abyss, before 2000 years
Your sky and it will descend - without filling again

You also know, you had bent under the anathema
The disaffection of the people and of the kings
If poor and if lost than you would not have more
For you lie down in peace
The breadth of your cross.

Your last temple, O Christ, is cold like a tomb
Your door does not open more on the vast future
Now the day falls and we hear coming
The old stooped priest who carries a dove!