There's nothing
you can do. Grace
doesn't hug you
or invite you to come,
and it never offers
grounds or reasons;
it snags you
by the mouth
like some draconian invention;
it gouges your cheek—
lodges deep there
like a barbed hook
and yanks you
right out of the depths
of your denial—
not even
shrieking, but
gasping for breath
with your lungs
cooking, full of that poison
called liability
and into the alien light
of absolution.
