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“Saint Jason” by Thomas Merton 🇺🇸 (31 Jan 1915 – 10 Dec 1968)
This is the night the false Saint Jason
Wakes in fear from his cannibal sleep,
And drenches the edges of his eyes
With his tears’ iron overflow;
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For the flying scream of his dead woman
Opened the stitches of his skin,
And Jason bounced in the burly wind
Like a man of sack and string.
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“What do you want, in the windows of your wound
Where Judas’ money shines
By daggers’ waterlight?”
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“—I want the martyrs’ eyes, as tight as shells,
In death’s pretended sleep.”
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“What does it mean sunlight weeps in your door
Like an abandoned child?”
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“—It means the heavyhanded storm,
Whirling and ploughing the wet woods,
Has filled with terrible speech
The stone doors of my feast:
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The feast of the false Saint Jason’s first communion.”