Zero at the Bone: Fifty Entries Against Despair

by Christian Wiman

Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live. Ezekiel 37:3–5 This is a promise of resurrection, both of individuals and of a nation. The prophecy links divine power to human speech, the Word to the word, eternity to time, and amounts to an assurance that the life of God and the life of humans are so raveled together that neither, for either, will ever be completely lost.

Christ may be in us. But ours are the only hands he has.

True hope goes backward as well as forward. It can transfigure a past we thought was petrified. It can give voice to certain silences or make us more fluent in silence itself. It can turn history into tragedy.