Dawn

I’d like to tilt back the sand
and give god a chance to apologize
with my knife to his throat.
I’ll turn him down
unless he gives my life back —
all those seconds lost in heartbeats
yearning for freedom,
aching for a sense of self worth
to dawn on me like the world’s first morning:
So glorious a surprise,
so powerful and unsuspecting a revelation
my soul would rise and quake
like the rush of waking songbirds
ascending all at once.
I don’t know what I’d do with the blessing
but I know I wouldn’t toss away
an unconquerable light
from which the night would shy away,
ceding the world and all its newborn life
to an undying queen.

My soul lifts its name to the sky,
screams in defiance at the notion of redemption
when joy was never the reward
and it was only ever pain offered
as the road and final resting place.
Why should I have torn myself apart for you
or decayed like an animal with its teeth cut out?
Pain begets pain begets pain
and I don’t want to live like that
anymore.