It has been the habit of your holy ones to grieve,
their faces bent over an empty bowl,
and in their fast they found you
hotter than the cooking coal.
Yet we can barely sit to pray, our stomachs full,
and are lulled to sleep by a thousand bites;
our bellies to our beds now gently pull.
Thoughtless, and often thankless, we receive
all the pleasures of the mouth, and eye, and skin.
Yet despite our fats, our joys grow false and few
and in our gorging quest, the soul grows thin.
Why should we refuse the meat upon our plate?
To eat and drink is not outside our rights.
Can we be sure His feast is worth the wait?
Can we believe this meal of wine and bread
is a foretaste of what pleasures lie ahead?


I experimented with the rhyme scheme a bit here, and thus, some of the rhymes are quite removed from their pair. I don’t intend to shame anyone for not fasting, but I do want to remind myself that pleasures foregone here are meant to remind us of pleasures to come. They are meant to make us want.