The Door
I’ve spent too many days
curled away from God,
squeezing my pillow tight.
Why are we most afraid
of the one road that can save us?
Carry us beyond hope of returning.
I guess that’s a question
that answers itself. One day
I will be filed away as ashes.
We cannot live beyond our time.
When that deep horn wails for us from afar,
there’s no refusing its call.
Why not lay my questions,
self-doubt and grudges to rest?
Why not wake to the soft miracle
of the everyday?
Soon I will realize that love
has caught me in a corner.
There is a bright white door.
I see myself
reaching for the handle.
Alfred Fournier is a writer and community volunteer in Phoenix, Arizona. His first poetry collection, A Summons on the Wind (2023, Kelsay Books), was nominated for the Eric Hoffer Book Award. His poems have appeared in Amethyst Review, Orchards Poetry Journal, Gyroscope Review, The Sunlight Press and elsewhere. Twitter (X): @AlfredFournier4, alfredfournier.com.
Amethyst Review 