They stamped you with a name you never chose Turned your breath into a case they could close Cut you open with language, said “this is the proof” Then sold you the bandage like it came from the truth Same blade, new label, dressed sterile and pure Same debt in a bottle they market as cure Pass the plate, pass the guilt, keep the cycle adored They tax your desperation Then rename it “the lord” And the waiting room hums With a fluorescent prayer Twenty three forms For a God who's not there Sign here for your suffering Initial your shame Co pay the original sin With your name The preacher adjusts His insurance rate smile Benediction by billing code Grace by the mile Salvation's in network If you qualify twice And the body of Christ Has a very steep price They built the confessional Out of fine print Absolution delayed For a deductible hint Kneel at the altar Of quarterly returns While the tithe that you gave them Compounds as it burns There is no devil In the details, they say Just a clause on the back Of the form for your stay Just an asterisk placed Where the miracle should be A footnote that reads "This salvation's not free" So you carry the cross Of an itemized bill Suffer the sermon Of each unfilled refill The hymn is a hold tone The heaven, a plan And the wound stays infected So the healer has land They patent the remedy Trademark the balm While the organ donor list Becomes a psalm The scripture is quarterly The gospel is growth And the poor inherit nothing Not even the oath You spoke to a saint With a seven minute clock She handed you pamphlets Then changed the door lock Referred you upstream To a specialist's fee Who referred you right back To your own misery There are rooms in this country That smell like despair Plastic chairs bolted down Like nobody cares Magazines yellowed From decades ago As if time stopped here And just refused to go As if suffering itself Were a waiting room state Chronic and managed Renewable, great A pipeline of bodies That need to return A furnace of illness That's built just to burn They name the foundations After those that they lost Run galas for cancer And never ask cost The ribbon is pink The champagne is poured They monetize mercy Then call it “the lord.” And somewhere a family Is choosing between The electric, the insulin And what that means Not metaphor Invoice The actual math The thing that comes after You've exhausted the path There is no parable here No turn at the end No lesson that heals What the system won't mend Just a wound and a bill And a looping refrain Same invoice, same body Same exquisite pain Same invoice Same wound The blood and the cost They'll sell you the index To everything lost And the lord of the ledger Will call it his grace While you bleed, very quietly In the appropriate place ~by Unreadhyperion
