The Good Shepherd: a new sonnet

an early depiction of Christ the Good shepherd from a mosaic in Ravenna

This Sunday, the Fourth Sunday of Easter, the Gospel set in the Lectionary is John 10:22-30, which contains Jesus’ beautiful saying ‘My sheep hear my voice and I know they follow me, I give them eternal life and they will never perish’. These verses are in fact a continuation of verses earlier in chapter 10, in which Jesus develops the image of shepherd, and declares, in one of the seven great ‘I Am’ sayings in John, ‘I Am the good shepherd, the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep’.

Reflecting on these linked verses, prompts me to post another poem from the ‘I Am’ sequence in my forthcoming book Parable and Paradox. When I came to write this poem, I found that what came out was a cry of pain, a lament. Jesus’ picture of…