Harrowing

Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly minded,
for, with blessing in His hand,
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
our full homage to demand.

King of kings, yet born of Mary,
as of old on earth He stood,
Lord of lords, in human vesture,
in the body and the blood.
He will give to all the faithful
His own self for heav'nly food.

Rank on rank the host of heaven
spreads its vanguard on the way,
as the Light of light descendeth
from the realms of endless day,
that the pow'rs of hell may vanish
as the darkness clears away.

At His feet the six-winged seraph,
cherubim with sleepless eye,
veil their faces to the Presence,
as with ceaseless voice they cry,
“Alleluia, alleluia,
alleluia, Lord Most High!”

——

He wakes in darkness, going down to sullen fields
When all keeps silence. Striving with the dull, damp soil,
Dew-wet and sweat-spattered, he wrests from cursed earth’s yields
An arduous harvest, raised with hard and bitter toil.

His bladed ploughshare bites its furrow, arrow-straight,
Rips deep, bares hidden depths of ancient fallow rot,
Now severed free to flourish. Earth’s all-grasping weight
He harrows loose; grips, strains in victory hard-fought. 

So let us wonder at such labor in this way:
For this is our Lord’s work on Holy Saturday.

His field is Sheol’s house; his fruit is souls long-bound;
With grace and blessing in his hand like wide-sown seeds,
He heaves salvation’s crop, up from the clinging ground,
And, praising, rank on rank, they follow where he leads. 

His plough uproots Hell’s gates; as darkness clears away,
Pale light grows in the east, so now he labors on.
The sun has not yet risen on this, the harrowing-day,
And he has far to till before the dawn—

This poem combines images from the ancient Eucharistic hymn Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence (sometimes used to celebrate Christmas, but historically sung on Holy Saturday) with a meditation on the traditional concept of the “harrowing of Hell”—that is, Christ’s descent into Hell between his crucifixion and resurrection, leading to the triumphant release of souls held captive there. Here, drawing on those influences, I envision Christ as an actual farmer with a harrow, ripping up the soil of Hell to free imprisoned souls.