“I had two or three times, at or about my deliverance from this temptation, such strange apprehensions of the grace of God, that I could hardly bear up under it: it was so out of measure amazing, when I thought it could reach me.“
—John Bunyan
Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, 1666
My son calls Milwaukee
from New York to report
three deer on the Bard
College Quad. He whispers
Don’t move, Mom! Deer!
as if I might spook them
by slurping coffee
a thousand miles away,
as if space were not space
but intimacy. I wait
as the deer pause
to graze, bending
their necks with a grace
John Bunyan thought
no one deserved,
and it’s true I learned
grievously late
how to mother a child—
that love is not a give and take
but a clearing. Yes,
I made mistakes
I can’t undo with more talking,
but grace in a far-flung state
is still grace abounding,
and if God’s not real
then grace must grow
wild all over the country.
by Angela Sorby
Angela Sorby’s award-winning books include Distance Learning (New Issues); Schoolroom Poets (UPNE); Bird Skin Coat (Wisconsin); and The Sleeve Waves (Wisconsin). She teaches at Marquette University in Milwaukee.
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