Paternoster Poem by Ivan Donn Carswell

they were not words I chose
but echoes ringing free of
circumstance; the wine gave
me an absolute and cast-iron
guarantee that I was not to
blame – as if I cared.

$30 retail wouldn’t seem the
cause by my acerbic happenstance
although enough I knew it wasn’t
sole and only origin to where
the paternoster true
anomalies were born

if you will give me words
I know I’ll pay your price
before you ever see the cause
of phrases jemmied from the
vault of what it was before
they made us nice...
© 2 December 2009, I. D. Carswell