A Forerunner's Song

I leapt before my lungs drew breath,
a dance within my mother’s womb,
stirred by the nearness of the Coming One,
the Word made flesh, still hidden.

Camel hair, coarse and rough, scraped my skin;
locust wings, brittle, cracked between my teeth.
Wild honey, golden and thick,
sweetened the harshness of the wilderness.
The Jordan cooled repentant flesh,
while my voice burned like fire in dry reeds:
“Repent, for the kingdom is at hand!”

I was not the Light,
but I bore witness to the Light.
I was not the Bridegroom,
but the friend who heard His voice and rejoiced.
The axe was at the root,
yet mercy flowed in living water.

I touched His shoulders once:
the Lamb without blemish,
the Dove descended,
the heavens broke with thunder.
I said, “He must increase, I must decrease,”
yet in prison my soul whispered:
“Are You the One?”

Bars rattled with silence,
but His deeds were my answer;
the blind saw, the lame walked,
the dead rose, the poor sang.
Doubt scorched me, yet worship rose;
fear shivered, yet flame burned brighter.

And when the blade descended,
my blood joined the prophets’.
My head lifted high, not for honor, but to mock,
served on a silver platter,
as thirty coins once would be.
The world forever weighs prophets and Messiahs
against the silver of its desire.

But the wilderness still echoes.
The Friend of the Bridegroom still smiles.
The Lamb still takes away the sin of the world.
And I—
I rejoice to have been a voice,
crying in the desert,
until the Word was heard.