Your love consumes us, white body;
love, which is hunger, love most profound;
it is the hunger of the creative Word
that became flesh; it became the love of life,
which cannot be satisfied by embrace, kiss
or the act of marital union,
only to take and eat – can quench our desire,
bread of immortality, divine Body of flesh and bones.
Our most profound love, love made of hunger,
oh, Lamb of God! Delicious food that satisfies you,
wants to taste your flavor, the taste of you yourself,
to taste your heart down to its very marrow,
melting like heavenly manna
in the warmth of our dry tongue:
how can one not rejoice in You: it is You who have taken what is ours,
the body we have and through your suffering
you revive the dead to life.
And your outstretched arms are a call, an example
of giving oneself in love, which is ever happening:
“Come! Eat! Take!: This is my body!”
Body of God, the Word made flesh, embodies
our hunger for God in its physicality.
(Miguel de Unamuno /1864–1936/, poem Eucaristía
translated by Josef Hrdlička)
