400 and 401

The final twenty minutes of the shift,

the Thursday eve before you fall asleep,

the floor before you get off of the lift,

the sixtieth slumber-ly-counted sheep.

The final chapters of old, dry textbooks,

the last talk ere a chapel is dismissed,

the lecturer when, up from notes, he looks,

the unchecked items on a grocery list.

The chips, uneaten, left within the bag,

the scruff, unshaven, by the razor last,

the way the untied shoelace tends to drag,

the untied thoughts that linger from the past.

On these I think while on sleep’s brink I drift

on these last twenty minutes of my shift.

~~~

I chose thee, not because I loved thee most,

nor due to plans or outlines I had made,

but since thou wast afflicted, with thy host,

I held thy chain and had thy price repaid.

I’d do the opposite, had roles reversed,

had thou indeed chained down thy captors, too.

The wronged and wicked are as last and first—

it matters more which deeds they choose to do.

Has this example been but naught for all

I’ve said regarding how I feel for men?

Do men still think I choose, to rise or fall,

not from one’s deeds, but if they say “amen”?

What more could I have done to prove not so?

Each vine is mine, and all thy fruits I know.