Grace

Sit carefully. Smell the soap,
A clean, slight cinnamon scent
That lingers on your fingers.

You are not at this table.
You couldn’t possibly be.
You are in a time and place

Probably distant from here.
Maybe you’ve just now appeared
At the foot of the sheer cliff,

Stunned by the dragon of days
You spot sprawled on display there.
Maybe you’re in an office

Surrounded by offices,
Lighted windows to the sky.
Maybe, by some miracle,

You’re in an old-fashioned shop,
A true secondhand bookstore,
Reeking of moldy carpet

In a small town, the other
Side of the world from this place
Where you lace freshly washed, sweet,

Soap-smelling hands together
In a kind of prayer, in faith
You are you, out there, somewhere.