Fragility

Who dares say they rest on solid ground,

firmly placed on the mountain tops of Zion?

Not us.

These illusory structures that succumb at the most unexpected of times,

it all collapses like rubble. Those realities we’ve tightly held on to,

even they begin to lose the quality of their mirage.

But the cause? – who is it, what is it? No. Rather you will see its terror in medical wards,

nursing homes and those who least expect it.

We are told it compromises the respiratory system,

so we attempt to concretize it in a new vocabulary

– Coronavirus, COVID-19, Sars-Cov-2, sanitizers, social-distancing, isolation, quarantine,

lockdowns, ventilators and graves.

This means little, when the number of those infected keeps rising

and the bodies keep pilling. What measure of safety is there when the home becomes

the potential abode of this Phantom?

When loved ones are suspected of symptoms that could potentially lead to deaths?

Who dares say they rest on solid ground?

Not us.

Yet some will say,

‘I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?’

But Jesus would lift up his eyes to the heavens and be forsaken by his God.

Now, who dares say they rest on solid ground, when this Phantom has uncovered

the façade of stability?

Fragility reigns and dwells amongst

our brokenness, our broken structures,

our broken messiahs and our broken God.

So we sit, reflect and anticipate what little light might make its way down here

maybe that light that illuminates the heights of Zion

will not forget us in our time of fragility

First published in The Anabaptist Network in South Africa Newsletter, Witnessing in a Pandemic, October 2020, Issue No.2

Recomposed here by Odinge Eigdo