Magi

What shall our questing hearts  
discover when the calling star
at last stands still
above a house or hill.
 
Will it be worth the drudgery
and pilgrim’s pains we have endured  
traversing moor
and mountain footed plains
in braving desiccating heat
and drowning rains,
bladed cold
and desert harrowings?
 
We will not know
until at journey’s end
we come to see
if it is life or death
to which we bend a knee
and take what’s
there before our eyes  
as then a desolation or
a sacrament.