"Hallowed Be Thy Shape" & "tomorrow, please" by Terri Gower

Hallowed Be Thy Shape

After the Lord’s Prayer

My body, which art on earth,

Hallowed be thy shape;

Thy touch come;

Thy body be loved

In life, as it is on earth:

Give me this day my daily breath;

And forgive me my self-hatred,

As I forgive you that hates against me;

And lead me not into self-pity,

But deliver me from insecurity;

For thine is the flesh,

And the skin, and the curves,

Which until death belongs to me.

tomorrow, please

Echoing walls wait with me everyday;

fleshy pink, collapsing in, and bouncing

the kettle-whistle of my rising/falling

breath that say                                                                                       [keep breathing, please]

as I knead my faltering arteries.

Walls stretch like faded flesh

when you bring me banal babbles

to bury the lub-a-dub-ub lub-a-dub-ub

as my enlarged right ventricle repeats                                              [keep beating, please]

while you rub my swollen feet.

Cage walls contract to say

time to go & leave me to

another blood-sucking needle

which whispers                                                                                     [keep bleeding, please]

while I wait for tomorrow

[please]

Terri Gower is an English as an Additional Language Teacher living on the traditional lands of the lək̓ʷəŋən speaking people (Victoria, BC, Canada). Her writing has appeared in South Child Lit (online), and the Bangs Zine.