Later

We quickly forgot

The taste of Bread and fish

When the crowd sat in even rows

And went home filled,

Singing down the hills.

Irascible in our flurry,

We rushed at the One who slept,

Languorous, below,

As if storm were but arms

To rock a cradle.

We turned from the stranger

Who confronted us on the road

Discoursing in the appalling metaphor

On the firstfruits of the dead.

Afterwards we scurried to our boat

To fish some time, expecting nothing,

Desiring nothing but dark,

As if body as we knew it

Were an end term

Come morning, relentless

He stood on the shore,

And again we did not recognize Him---

As if our death and this sweat

Were preferable to eternal life.