I’m from down under in NZ, so our Lenten season is inverted, where we journey through autumn to winter rather than spring to summer. Feel free to use it.
 
Outside on Ash Wednesday

It is dark outside
where the rage of humankind
is voiced by tents on fire
encircled by vultures
tweeting furiously
from armchairs far away.

It is dark outside
where a plague is set free
to infect those it can
and subdue them
into unhealth
and possible death

It is dark outside
while the missiles streak
Kiev’s night skies
as human remains
heap on an ambiguous
battlefront

It is dark outside
as the colonisers
tread heavily upon
illegally acquired land
in woeful and corrupt
ignorance

It is dark outside
as poverty still remains
and homelessness
rises to meet
the dawning
winter ice

It is dark outside
as withered spirits
beaten by the system
throw rocks at each other
thinking ‘might makes right’
while their soul unravels
in middle-class malaise

It is dark outside
because as mere collections of dust
we try to make wisdom
out of the nothing
from which we came
and to which one day
we will return

It is dark outside
even as a distant light
shimmers on the wasteland
for those who seek ruach
the divine wind that fills us
with the very breath of God

Stu McGregor
Pastor, Cityside Baptist Church, Auckland, New Zealand
March 2022