We sing because God sings,

and the great mystery grows

among lilies, lilacs and rose

while mother dies, and the bell rings

in a season we’re still to know.

We sing because God sings over us,

a great mystery we each yearn to tone.

“I will establish the throne

of his Kingdom for ever,” heard Nathan,

about a king, a king whose words we weep to sing:

                Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation.

We sing because God sings in us

nails that pierce with a glad healing

beyond our little life and feeling,

the Good Thief’s great lesson in loss and trust;

it is our despair that He is stealing.

We sing because God sings

of what a human will become

when no longer deaf and dumb

to all that promised Beauty brings:

The City. The Garden. Lord, quickly come.

Nathan Woods is a caseworker in central Pennsylvania, and an editor at “The Symbolic World” blog. He recently became a member of the Eastern Orthodox Church after being raised as a heathen.