1 These things did Thomas count as real:
the warmth of blood, the chill of steel,
The grain of wood, the heft of stone,
the last frail twitch of flesh and bone.
2 The vision of his skeptic mind
was keen enough to make him blind
To any unexpected act
too large for his small world of fact.
3 His reasoned certainties denied
that one could live when one had died,
Until his fingers read like Braille
the markings of the spear and nail.
4 May we, O God, by grace believe
and thus the risen Christ receive,
Whose raw, imprinted palms reached out
and beckoned Thomas from his doubt.
