Personal Eden

A key to His deedbox
is draped around my neck,
my soul in safekeeping
is weighed by the consequence
of corrupting forgiveness,
taking it for granted
and counting on a divine amnesty
to save me after...

I've defiled the garden,
plundering grapes for my own
and lazily anticipating
the fermented bulk
of ripe, inviting vines
and the lawless passions 
of inebriation

and I've shared the taint
with restless souls 
too cowed to step away 
from prophetic certainty,
yet on the edge of doubt
where angels fall and demons climb

into that middle realm where 
life always feels a lot like sin,
and death a glorified damnation
to rest eternity
in a blessed or cursed extreme.

Both promising return
to the tempting core of Life,
seducing weary servants
into selling their identity
in the name of a forever paradise,
a universally packaged set of pleasure...

the preordained pleasures 
of over and under, 
dark and light, 
heaven or hell,
good or bad,
of never yearning 
or forever yearning

But my Eden lies between
where I can afford to pay
the consequences of my desires
because I have reaped the rewards.
Copyright © | Year Posted 2007

Poem

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