People clean their homes before the feast. <br />Stepping from the bustle of the street <br />I go down before Thee on my knees <br />And anoint with myrrh Thy holy feet. <br /> <br />Groping round, I cannot find the shoes <br />For the tears that well up with my sighs. <br />My impatient tresses, breaking loose, <br />Like a pall hang thick before my eyes. <br /> <br />I take up Thy feet onto my lap, <br />Wash them clean with hot tears from my eyes, <br />In my hair Thy precious feet I wrap, <br />And my string of pearls around them tie. <br /> <br />I now see the future in detail, <br />As if it were stopped in flight by Thee. <br />Like a raving sibyl, I could tell <br />What will happen, how it will all be. <br /> <br />In the temple, veils will fall tomorrow, <br />We shall form a frightened group apart, <br />And the earth will shake-perhaps from sorrow <br />And from pity for my tortured heart. <br /> <br />Troops will then reform and march away <br />To the thud of hoofs and heavy tread, <br />And the cross will reach towards the sky <br />Like a water-spout above our heads. <br /> <br />By the cross, I'll fall down on the ground, <br />I shall bite my lips till I draw blood. <br />On the cross, your arms will be spread out- <br />Wide enough to hug the whole wide world. <br /> <br />Who's this for, this glory and this strife? <br />Who's this for, this torment and this might? <br />Are there enough souls on earth, and lives? <br />Are there enough cities, dales and heights? <br /> <br />But three days-such days and nights will pass- <br />They will fill me with such crushing dread <br />That I'll see the joyous truth, at last: <br />I shall know Christ will rise from the dead.<br /><br />Boris Pasternak<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/mary-magdalene-ii/
