A faith introspection – Lent
©ESR 2026

We were carved from olive wood…
from a tree that has known the press,
that has given oil for lamps
and oil for wounds
and oil for kings.

We remember crushing.

Her fingers move over us tonight
with the steadiness of someone
who has been thinking too long.

On the table rests a glass of amber…
deep as honey in shadow,
goldened like resin held to flame.
It glows in lamplight
the way spikenard must have glowed
before it was broken.

She looks at it.

And we feel the wanting.

Not for drink.

For devotion.

Her finger dips into the brandy
as if answering a call.
Not reckless.
Not defiant.

Instinctive.

She touches us…
one bead,
then the next.

Warmth seeps into our grain.
Olive wood drinking in
distilled fire and time.

We know this story.

Mary Magdalene knew it too,
the woman who shattered the jar
and let spikenard fall like surrender
onto feet dusted from the road.
The scent filled the room.
The cost offended the practical.
But love does not measure itself
by thrift.

Her thumb moves again.

Hail Mary,
full of grace…

Each bead receives its portion.
Not spilled.
Anointed.

We are Marian by repetition,
but tonight we are also witness.

The amber darkens our surface slightly…
not stain,
not indulgence…

consecration.

Her prayer smooths like the brandy down her throat…
slow,
warming,
settling into places
that needed tending.

We remember burial.

Spikenard poured again…
not in triumph,
but in grief.

The mother who once cradled him
now dressing her son
with costly oil
for the last time.

And as these hands anoint these beads,
memory bends toward that hill…
toward linen and trembling breath…
toward the moment
when a mother
dressed her son in spikenard,
and prepared him for His beginning.