! ! To Holy Russia

The door creaks, as she opens it and the fall of the heavy iron latch echoes through the empty church. The atmosphere inside, this cold cold day, is heavy, as such holy places are; locked now at night; heavy, with what? Anticipation; presence; memory of all the human emotions that have passed through them? There’s still the clinging promise, the fragrance of yesterday’s incense; it could be a midnight cedar forest in its dark wood-scented mystery. She lights a candle, drops a coin slowly, as those do to whom each coin has a meaning. She is small, shrunken as the aged are, wrapped into roundness against the cold, yet neatly; today there’s an extra sense of purpose about her walk towards the glittering gold ikonostasis – is it the anniversary of the day her husband perished in the labour camp? Or the day her son died fighting so that such as she might live, to mourn him, proudly, all her life? Or was she, is she, that unmarried, once famous junior lecturer who lost her job for speaking truth, whose students carried her shoulder-high and placed her on the tank outside the university, challenging its gun? She kneels in front of the ancient ikon, thick with gold; the ikon that tourists note with brief glance as ‘Christ’…though when painted, it was known as ‘Son of God’; now they call it ‘Son of Man’ – that seems to suit it. She looks intently into His eyes as she has so many times; each time, a new day, asking what He has in store for her; asks as intently as its painter: praying as he worked, that He might come and fill the painted form with His eyes, His heart, His soul; all that He brought to earth from That which sent Him… She looks into the eyes of the ikon – or does the ikon look at her? In some other world, there is mighty sound, perhaps a word; the air is filled with soundlessness; there’s fire that burns forever; great waters flow like grace itself; new earth is watered. She sees, in some great where between herself and all things, love that cannot be measured; mercy that can only explain itself with itself; grace that’s only to be known; her heart opens itself to her soundlessly; all is revealed to the seeking heart. The candles flicker in the draught; the door creaks, and the heavy iron latch echoes once, in the empty church; the Son of Man, as an old woman, wrapped against the cold, steps out into His kingdom. A few snowflakes; a pale winter sun. But look into His eyes. * (revised)