Francis and the Crib at Greccio
Francis and the Crib at Greccio
One witness, among the crowd …. reported that Francis included a carved doll which …. seemed to be awakened from sleep when the blessed Father embraced him in both arms. *
He led them up the stony path
at dusk on Christmas eve.
He asked them to bring light,
so, with sticks dipped in pitch
and all manner of stubby candles
they followed him to the cave.
Gathering to a luminescence
in that rocky aperture
his Bethlehem, earthen womb,
a veiled threshold to heaven.
He had found a donkey,
cross backed and a cow,
udder full and calf needy,
and with straw he coaxed
them to settle into sleep.
And for the pallet of
golden forage, his hands,
long fingered and dexterous,
had carved a babe to incarnate,
in wood, the long awaited one.
John of Greccio,
whose cave it was,
witnessed the tears of Francis,
flowing in remembrance
of that uncertain birth
under imperial servitude.
And John was sure the
carven fingers uncurled,
chiselled eyes blinked back
the smokey lights
to see once more
wonder in the eyes of
villeins to liege lords.
Francis finally spoke of
the terrifying helplessness
that was undertaken to show
that each of us, womb born,
is a doorway to divinity.
And each saw the arc
of heaven stooping
into the ordinary and
the commonplace,
revealing each illuminated face
as god again, and again, and again
shouldering human form.
He lifted the sleeping
child who stirred miraculously,
cribbed in the tender love
of one who beheld what
thrones and dominations occlude,
what those who gaze upward never see.
*https://theconversation.com/how-st-francis-created-the-nativity-scene-with-a-miraculous-event-in-1223-124742