Into the heat of the night to chase Lazarus,
for I know what I want to learn from him:

how he got over his anger at his friend
for pulling him back into the struggle. 

I want to ask him how long he held the grudge
and if he led with it whenever he and Jesus talked,

if indeed they ever spoke again after that day,
which seems likely though it’s unrecorded.

How do you have that conversation
about him not just saving your life,

but pulling it all the way back from bankruptcy
and liquidation to deposit it right back where it had been

as if nothing had happened at all and anything 
that soul had seen while it was gone could be forgotten?

I know it can’t.  Know it for a fact.
And I need to know how to speak to a friend

who brought me back just like that, even though 
in my case I really wanted to go.  I want to know

how I’m supposed to be his friend again.
I want to know if it’s even right to try — and if anyone

should know it’s Lazarus. How did he and Jesus
get past it, if they did at all?  They never

put that in the Gospels.  They never made
a sermon out of that.