FLIGHT INTO EGYPT

Fleeing, you hold the child God to your heart.

Not like Rachel with the teraphim

hid in her bag, creatures of human art,

the one you hold is sung by seraphim

in the inmost court of heaven—even thus

suckling at your breast. You hold him near

who holds the entire world in perilous

security, and, driven by your fear,

the memory of soldiers and of swords, 

you take the road to Egypt, to the land

that once meant slavery and now affords

perhaps a place for refugees to stand

upright again, pondering all the while

why God-with-us is nurtured in exile.