Meysey Hampton church (Cotswolds) has stained
glass fragments pertaining to the crucifixion. I believe they
were discovered in a barn, sold to the Paul Getty museum,
but have been returned home.
I’m Dismas.
Who the hell is that? you ask.
And where’s the other rogue – the one who mocked?
If I say I’m The Penitent Good Thief,
does that give you a clue? Through gritted teeth,
I am trying to process a promise
that I’ll be translated to Paradise.
I’d get there sooner if they’d break my legs.
I can hardly breathe for my fractured ribs.
At the cusp of salvation/ damnation,
I turned my face, to see He’d gone ahead.
Some think my pardon was an act of grace,
bestowed because I showed a flash of faith,
but others say it was a just reward,
because I stopped those bandits – and Gestas
(no longer with us) from nicking gold,
frankincense, myrrh from that Man’s family,
aeons ago, when they were fugitives.
I asked then that He should remember me,
should our paths cross again – one day they did.
Well, some say Christ Himself was a Good Thief,
since He stole us back from Satan’s kingdom.
Do two wrongs make a right? I do not know,
but I am warming to the paradox.
Salvabitur vix justus in die
judicii/ ergo salvabitur.*
I’m a glimpse of your hope of glory.
Hey, you malefactors – just look and live!
Everything else is a heap of smithereens.
I joined Him in Sheol and freed captives,
but, for the life of me, I do not know
what happened to Gestas; nor where he is.
I was found, restored and here I hang now –
unbaptised, but, oddly, beatified,
waiting for my promised resurrection.
Uncertain of what was meant by ‘today,’
but first in the queue to meet St Peter.
Meanwhile, give me a sip of that wormwood
and, since He didn’t want His, I’ll have it.
For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die, but God commendeth His love towards us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
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