O Barren One

O barren one, sing out, break forth in song! Prepare a room, no, add a wing to host the children that you’ve waited for so long! Your offspring will inhabit every coast! Lift your sweet face, o spurned, deserted, scorned! Let go your indiscretions of the past. For I, the Lord of Hosts, have you adorned, and tightly, with compassion, hold you fast! O city, desolate in smoldering waste, your rebuild has commenced this very hour! Your enemies are routed, flee in haste, for I, the Lord will stand watch in the tower! Recline, put off your burdens and abide; come all who thirst, drink deep, be satisfied! (from Isaiah 54) ---------- I originally wrote this as a sonnet, but entered it into a contest with the last two lines expanded to a quatrain and classified it as a lyric. Trying to collect all my sonnets together, so I'm adding the original...