One of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius is a meditation on the meeting of Jesus and Mary on the morning of the resurrection. The retreatant is encouraged to let delight and love of this encounter permeate her entire being. This poem is an effort to put into writing the result of such a prayer experience.
She lay unsleeping in the pre-dawn darkness, pondering, pondering in her heart that long and heavy day. All through the night she had relieved her life with him. She ached with memory, who, she questioned, was this son, and who the God whose will he had so bravely come to do?
She thought again about his friends – Ashamed, confused, and frightened. Had they slept, she wondered. Would they ever laugh again? What would she say to comfort them when morning came?
Across the room she heard the other women stir. “It’s almost day,” they whispered. “Come with us. We’re going to the tomb.”
“You go,” she said, I’ll stay and start the bread. The brothers will be hungry when they wake.”
But when the other women left, she knew there was another reason she had stayed behind. She knew – and yet she did not know she know – They would not find his body in the tomb.
She sat alone beside her bed, and thought again of Jesus, Hearing in her heart again the echoes of his dying words:
“I thirst … This day you will be with me … Father, Why … Forgive, they know not … Here, your mother …
“Woman, here I am. Your son.” She heard the words aloud! His voice! Her son alive and standing in the doorway! “Woman, peace, “he said, and took her hands in his and raised her to her feet. “My mother, peace.” He held her tired body gently in his arms.
She stood in silent wonder, Slowly letting truth come home. “My son,” she said at last.
“My son,” Her lips were trembling with her unshed tears, and tenderly she touches his face to let her fingers tell her once again, that he was really with her. “Jesus! Son!” She took his hand and kissed the open wound.
He sat beside her on the window seat. “At times I didn’t think I’d make it, Mother.So much anguish. So much fear. I did not think my love was strong enough.” “But, Jesus, you kept praying for them all, kept calling to your Father …” “And I really was afraid He didn’t hear.” He shook his head as if to shake his fear.
“You suffered so,” she said, “and there was nothing I could do for you. I felt so helpless, Jesus!”
“Mother, you were there,” he said. “I needed that. I needed you to be there. So did John.”
She sat up suddenly. “The brothers, Jesus! Do they know? The women don’t. They left here early, just before you came. They took the oils to anoint your body…” Then she wept. The joy, the grief, the tiredness. The love swept through her body in great aching sobs. He held her, calming her with strength.
She spoke at last: “We lost one, Jesus.”
“Yes” he said, “I know.”
“If only he had come to me like Peter did.”
“So Peter came here, Mother. That was good.” He smiled then and stood to leave.
"I must go find them all," he said.
"The women will have reached the tom by now," she said.
"The brothers slept together in the supper room."
He kissed her gently on the cheek. "Shalom," he said. "Shalom." And he was gone.
She leaned against the doorframe drinking in the sun, Not knowing how to think or feel.
He was alive! Her son alive!
He lives, he lives, he lives, she thought,
The joyful message pounding in her blood.
She stopped and folded back the bed. "I'd better get some breakfast made, " she said aloud. "The brothers will be hungry when they wake."
Awake, awake, awake, the woman chanted, Grinding out her wheat with ancient grace. And what a waking this new day would bring!
