I no longer ask for flattery.
I do not ask for ease.
Only remain—
keep your clear gaze
on the patterned floor of my days,
on the breath that rises and falls,
on the narrow hinge where I decide.
Set your eye in the flame,
not to burn, but to reveal.
Draw your circle round my hunger
until wildness learns its key,
until want inclines to ought,
until base metal remembers light.
And when I fall—
for dust obeys its law—
grant me the plain strength to stand and sweep,
to strike the line true;
to lift the bent, shelter the battered,
restore the lost to their own face;
to guard the small with law,
to choose the quiet good over noise,
to set one small flame against the dark.
This is enchantment stripped of spectacle:
not a word flung once into air,
but a life spoken in rooms of habit,
a vow kept among dust and dishes,
a green blade through ash—
The brighter the lamp, the clearer the dust.
So I sweep, and let the lamp judge.
