Dear Mr. Zinobar:
Can You forgive the members You know best?
Petty grievances,
petty give-nesses,
petty members best forgivenesses?
For high is their take-ness,
high is their forgetfulness.

Who sings “yes” for these members?
Their inappropriate laughs and lovers
and wreckings and buildings of egos and
broken limbs and broken spirits,
and broken covenants,
and messy selves.

Dear Mr. Zinobar:
Can You forgive a nonmember who is song-less?
My wantings, my beggings, my selfish petty askings,
songless and soundless in this church?

Dear Mr. Zinobar:
Forgiver of members You know best.
Their petty doings
and petty likenesses
and petty hands and petty fingers and petty thoughts.
Petty children adored.
You forgive their wreckings of others’ egos
and self destructive petty manners.
And oh we do love, Mr. Zinobar,
our petty lives.
And we have bungled our choices,
oh, these mysteries of heart.