Velamen: Canto II
Though alive again, this resurrected never felt so lost.
No Nazarene alighted before me to bear my Cross.
Alone and afraid, affrighted and benighted,
Under a starless darkness,
Prey in which the wicked father delighted.
What is freedom’s purpose if there is no direction?
An enslaved spirit after all, offers no protection,
And protection was something I needed;
Lest the tangible darkness forever crush the hope of this seedling.
My state was like the Freedmen, and with a single act of emancipation,
I became a glimmer of hope, but like them, their participation
In an unrighteous nation made their dreams go up in smoke.
Could I hope to avoid the inhalation while still being cloaked?
By the shadow of that which once bound me?
I stay staring at my grave plot, ignorant of that what occurred around me.
But it soon found me, a light, magnificent, and astounding,
The chorus of “Swing Low” overflowed from my heart,
Booming and resounding.
Calling me to where? Where would this chariot bear me?
Would it take me to a place where things cease to scare me?
To my forefathers, as Odysseus to Laertes?
A place free from the warmongering of Ares,
But just as it arrived, the beam began to shrink.
I tracked the guide taking no time to think,
No time to process this new found freedom.
The only thing on my mind was the luminescent leading.
My heart thumped as blood pumped into legs long atrophied.
One would think the stasis of the years would catch me,
But something buoyed me at each step, bearing me through the land I slept
Feeling like a child who believes all promises made to him are kept,
But the forest was not done yet, the Kingdom had not come yet,
Thorny tendrils and vines vied for me like darkness at sunset.
Like bullets from a gun, yet the artillery was guided,
My only safety and refuge was the fleeting light in which I confided.
Never did I think that one could be found courageous in flight.
Wars are won by might, not by running under cover of night.
Instinct kicked in, giving no mind to the lacerations on my frame.
I’d worry about them when I got free, being united with my name.
