The Children’s Crusade of 1212

Aching for Acre, in a sacred ague,
They’re setting out. They wear only their nightgowns,
These ageless androgynes, these little angels
Who raise their wooden swords and hymns of glass.

They’re saying how the journey there will be
A stroll between aquariums reviewing
Divisions of moray and scorpionfish,
The laughing seahorse cavalries of heaven,

Jerusalem like candy on a shelf
A child on a child on a child
(All three on tiptoe) might just reach, and God

Himself the next shelf up. Their smallest soldier
Shoulder by shoulder climbs the swaying tower
And gets his hands around a jar of ashes.