Rick McGrath Poet Free verse

AT THE TABLE THAT STILL BREATHES

The room was never emptied.
We only learned to forget how to see it.

The bread is not quiet.
It remembers hands that broke it
and a voice that gave thanks
with the weight of the world pressing in.
It remembers love strong enough
to call betrayal by name
and still offer itself.

We come with polished language
and distant thoughts,
calling it remembrance
as if memory could hold what heaven pours out.

But something stirs
when the cup is lifted.

Not metaphor.
Not a shadow.
Not a careful reenactment
of something long finished.

There is a nearness
that unsettles the soul.

The kind that exposes
how lightly we have carried sin,
how quickly we excuse
what nailed Him there.

The table does not flatter us.
It reveals us.

Here, pride tastes bitter.
Here, hidden things rise to the surface
like leaven we thought was gone.

And yet
we are not turned away.

The bread is given, not earned.
The cup is extended, not withheld.

This is the mystery
that humbles angels
and calls sinners to their knees.

That He would not only die for us
but give Himself to us
again and again
in a way that is more than thought,
more than symbol,
more than memory.

We do not consume an idea.
We receive a Person.

And in receiving
we are undone.

The heart softens.
The will bends.
The soul, once scattered,
is gathered back into Him.

There is life here.
Not imagined
but imparted.

Strength for the weak.
Mercy for the guilty.
Fire for the cold places
we have left untouched.

The table becomes an altar
where we lay down what we have defended
and rise with what we could never create.

This is where repentance feels like breathing.
Not forced
but necessary.

Because how can we hold the cup
and cling to what killed Him?

How can we taste His goodness
and remain unchanged?

So we come trembling
not in fear of rejection
but in awe of welcome.

We come empty
that we might be filled.

We come broken
that we might be made whole.

And as the bread is placed in our hands
and the cup meets our lips
we remember
and we receive
and we are remade.

The room was never emptied.
The invitation never faded.

The table still stands
set before us
with a holiness that calls our name.

Come and partake.

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