“Take and eat,” the serpent said,
Amid the calm of almond trees.
“You will not die, but see instead,
And so be free from his decrees.”
The tree of good and evil known
That God had grown in Eden’s breeze
Became a cross of curses thrown
Upon the fruit that hung alone.
The dying seed was sown for peace
And there the tree of life was grown.
For he who bled on bended knees,
Submitting to his holy head,
Had led his men at supper’s ease
To “Take and eat my wine and bread.”

References: Gen. 3:1-7, Matt. 26:26-29, Rev. 22:1-5

This poem is a Sal, a chiastic form that I invented a few years ago. The idea for this particular poem comes with thanks to Mitch Bedzyk, without whom I would have never heard this glorious quote by Derek Kidner:

She took…and ate: so simple the act, so hard its undoing. God will taste poverty and death before ‘take and eat’ become verbs of salvation.

Genesis: An Introduction and Commentary (London: The Tyndale Press, 1967), 68 (HT: Dan Warne). Quote found here.

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