Belshazzar’s Feast Copyright © Victor Weston 2011

I had been invited to a
performance of Beshazzar’s Feast;
it would be as if the history of our own time
was being enacted before us

The Archbishop Rowan had spoken *
of the “shaking of nations”
and in the market place
people speak of doom and gloom

The performance at the Cathedral, Ely
was a celebratory occasion:
four Cambridge choirs
and St Johns College’s 500th anniversary

The light & the shadows gave a trancendent appearance
to this sacred space
people glanced at their watches
waiting for the time of the beginning

An arresting wall of sound welled up from the mouths facing
proclaiming the mystery of the reign of our God
and that the writing’s on the wall for this civilisation
who also have exhalted themselves as if there was no God

The desecration of the sacred vessels the disregard of all thats holy
- the cymbals are sounding -
Babylon the great is falling - be glad
those in captivity can leave, and return home to “Jerusalem”

* at the Guildhall, London