Hail
Bryce A. Taylor
December 2010

Like this Auschwitz barbed-wire rosary—
    clipped with teeth and finger twisted,
black-blood-stained, rain-encrusted,
    thorny, skin-pricking, motherly-misery-
pregnant, passed from hand to bone-ripped
    ashen hand, brand of traitors
to the empire, fire in chokehold chambers
    sparking visions of seraphic coal-tipped
tongs, rag-hidden prayer
ridden pearl
    pruned from Israel’s bondage, now a
sign of our ingrafted bough, the
    mangled laughingstock of the world—

Like this, dear son, is the whole of the blessed
    and jubilant faith that we confess.