I watch the inner face and pray
by putting that aside today
which troubled one with sensual fires
to break the cycle with their pyres.
We get caught in recurrent rings
with lust such ideation brings;
the usual sin and error pair.
I watch it dwindle in the air.
A black cloud dissipates in style
and I am grateful all the while.
I'm grateful for small things and great;
for bread from God upon my plate;
for thought and feeling, blood and flesh;
for combine harvesters that thresh;
for grackles, love birds, and the Moon;
for systems modeling to tune.
When lust departs, love enters in
the guest room vacated by sin
and marries truth. They bear good deeds
whose gardens tangled wild with weeds.
They've driven out the Canaanite
and Perizzite. They've welcomed light
and heat and flesh and blood of Christ
where Egypt's flesh pots once sufficed.
