Hero
My words make sense tonight, this cell
Which has become my private hell
Is beaten back with an ancient word
That comes with menace, as a sword
And echoes off the frozen walls.
My pride rebells, and then it falls.
I am a prisoner to you,
Aware of what my God should do
But doesn't- somehow I'm set free.
The sun and grass and sky I see
Beyond these walls must be a lie.
I said I should give up, should die.
And I refused the proffered key,
That would have made a free soul of me.
Yes, I refused, but I am not
The one, he said, to stay and rot.
Yet I insisted, prepared to fight,
As I had done both day and night
Since first I fell. But the stubborn hound
Of Heaven calls me, lost and found,
To break free and when I resist,
He tears the walls, he will insist
Until he has his way in me;
Until I his mercy see.
No more can I resist the one
Who turned the moon back into the sun,
And gave the key to steal my soul,
And made the shattered pieces whole.
How can one sole prisoner face
The relentless, rushing, pulse of grace?
In light of all your reasons given
I belong to the God of Heaven
And prison walls won't stand against
The wrath of mercy when incensed.
And all my chains, in potent thunder,
All my binds are torn asunder,
For I cannot resist the force
Who frees and sets me on my course,
And opens doors, and leads the way
From grasping blackness into day.
postscript
Part three of three. Who is the hero here, really?