By Jim Perkinson, on John 4:5-42, for the beloved community that meets at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church (right) at the corner of Trumbull and Michigan in Detroit.

o, the waters, the waters, the waters

o jacob, my father

o leah, my mother

o rachel, crying after the lost ones

the waters, the waters

fall on the dust

drop on the dry

heat and run like beads, like hope

breaking into rivulets, draining, fleeing

into the dust of my feet

o jacob, my brother

o leah, my sister

o rachel in child-birth, in mother-death

crying my heart

crying my heat

crying the fleet drip of hope

into the dust at my feet

you, o woman, in the midday glare

offering these waters from where?

you, o woman, of dark eye

you, o woman, with bone of flint

you, woman, cup your hand

offer the wine of a soul lost sigh

for memory like the dust of reverie

you, woman, give drink

you, woman, give drought

you woman, host the waters

of god in your belly

will you break?

will you fall before your destiny?

will you open the gates of the ghost

and step free?

will you become the water

you came so secretly to sip?

will you turn, now

and flow for me?

o, the waters

o, the waters

o, the waters

of the tears

of god like a river

of the broken open

and the free.

cry for me, o woman

cry for me.