Driving out to pick up my weekly order of organic whole milk and grass-fed beef this afternoon, I was struck by the relevance of a song I recorded back in 2012 with my sons for our Full Fathom Five EP: “Gardens of the Grave.” In a time when I have intentionally limited my consumption of media (and at times food), the words of the song rang strikingly true.
We are surrounded by the gardens of the grave.
The night has been trying to swallow the day (the darkness attempting to swallow the light). People have lost hope, mostly because they have misplaced their hope. The harvest of our misdeeds is ripe before us, whether we can clearly see it or not. We are slaves to fear, having been fed lies so long that we can’t even taste the difference between deception and truth, our tongues too coated with the sugary-sweetness of the deceit. And we have contracted a far more deadly disease than COVID.
Hope, love, and faith will never be found in the bounty of these gardens. We need saving from our gardens of the grave. No man can do it. No media can proclaim it. No political party holds a corner on the market. Religion itself will fail us. Seek the harvest of the empty tomb, watered from bloody wounds – a living harvest that never fails and never runs out.
Gardens of the Grave
Vincent H. Anastasi 2012
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you been where the night swallows the day?
Have you dug in the earth where hopelessness is birthed?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you sown in the souls of the unsaved?
Have you planted the seed that will fruit with our misdeeds?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you tended the fears that keep enslaved?
Have you watered and fed those lies within your head?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Have you gathered the harvest it’s displayed?
Have you bundled in sheaths our ubiquitous disease?
Have you been to the gardens of the grave?
Now we feast on the gardens of the grave
Without hope, and without love, and without faith.
Though our bellies all are full, they are empty without You;
Come and save in the gardens of the grave!
Oh! come and save in the gardens of the grave!
Sow yourself in the tomb and water it from bloody wounds
And restore with the life in glory paid!
Oh! come and save in the gardens of the grave!
Sow yourself in the tomb; water it from bloody wounds
And restore with the life in glory raised!
Yes, come restore all these gardens of the grave.
the deepening ground 