Redemption

The Negative Way

The violated self struggles to redeem herself  

through an endless round of mindless acts

and empty gestures.  Dressed in widow’s weeds 

she mourns the absence of redemption’s healing

presence, while she sifts through the fragments

 of her broken life searching for answers. 

Desperate to find release from her suffering, she

embraces one new thing after another: each 

advancement in art and science, each new cultist

claim of invincibility, each fad of commercial

promise, the latest miracle drug to ease her pain,

and each new relationship one after the other.  

Disconsolate and bewildered by her loss, she cannot

comprehend why redemption is beyond her ability

to receive.