Grave Angels - Joe Henry

We are gathered together

We are hidden from view—

In a tangle of laurel, we tear at our sorrow

Like bread and we start up anew;

Where a circus stands blazing

And steam engines brake and whine

In a razed hobo jungle your lost and found wonder

Has risen and mixes with mine

Then, foolish we are, in the presence of God

And what all his grave angels have done—

In love’s growling weather, if we’re dreaming together

Of a heaven apart from this one…

Apart from our own

I take this to be holy—

If futile, uncertain and dire:

Our union of fracture, our dread everlasting

This beautiful, desperate desire

The cloud darkens to harrow

It crosses your heart like hand

But it’s cool like the shadow of all that we’ve seen by the

Light that we can’t understand

Then, foolish we are, in the presence of God

And what all his grave angels have done—

In love’s growling weather, if we’re dreaming together

Of a heaven apart from this one…

Apart from our own

There’s a new year starting backwards

From high up in naked trees

That threw all their clothes like burning money

To the ground and all around our knees

We live outside of reason

And we’re called to stand out of time—

To hover above the rough river of love

That runs ahead but calls from behind

Then, foolish we are, in the presence of God

And what all his grave angels have done—

In love’s growling weather, if we’re dreaming together

Of a heaven apart from this one…

Apart from our own