Ashes to Ashes

This is a poem by Edward Hays I have loved his writing for years

ASHES TO ASHES: 

A PSALM OF THE HOLY SPIRIT


Holy Fire of God
descend as once you did in times of old,
furnace full of searing flames
engulfing ancient Mount Sinai
in the fullness of God’s presence.


Fire Storm of the Holy;
wind-sweep your wall of flame over me
in a rain Pentecostal love,
and burn me to ashes, again.


Ages before ages past, my flesh was once
the glowing ashes of a dead sun
drifting to Earth as star-flakes
to become again the stuff of life.


No mere dark clay or Earth-dirt am I,
for star-studded space was my womb.
Ashes to ashes, star dust to star dust,
so bury me now in the passion of God’s furnace
so I can rise, phoenix-like
to a new way of living and loving. 


Edward Hays (from Psalms for Zero Gravity)

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