trinity sunday
april 12, 2018
we shall sit and speak around
one table, share one food, one earth.
—Rowan Williams, "Rublev"
Trinity appears in flashes.
You must be careful
not to grasp it by the tailcoats
but receive each
ephemeral epiphany,
incarnate in its oddity,
as guest of honor.
You must welcome
strangers, contingent
angels, stumbling
accidentally to your neatly-
laid dinner table.
They will mess it up.
Audacious re-arrangers
make bold to rejigger
the life you have configured.
Re-set the plates,
pour them water yet again,
straighten out the silverware
and ask them how their day's been.
Each accident's necessity—
God cannot be substituted,
but embraced
where three intimate angels
gather in one name.