Abstract
Answered Prayer Brian Volck (bio) —after George Herbert What foolishness to quarrel with your willor think I might contend with One so just.What engine might I build to breach the wallsof One whose spirit animates the dust? Yet still I voice my grievances and waitupon the bench to try my pending suit,not knowing what your sanction may entailthough certain your decrees are absolute. But then I hear my cries to You reversed,returned in kindness, not in kind, a tunelike thunder transposed to some gentler key,reproaching softly all that I presume. Your answer does not rectify my plightbut circles me in mercy, love, and power,a presence that lays siege to my own wallsand bursts the gate unto this sinner's tower. [End Page 320] Brian Volck Brian Volck is a pediatrician who received his undergraduate degree in English Literature and his MD from Washington University in St. Louis and his MFA in creative writing from Seattle Pacific University. He is the author of a poetry collection, Flesh Becomes Word, and a memoir, Attending Others: A Doctor's Education in Bodies and Words. brian.volck@gmail.com. Copyright © 2021 Johns Hopkins University Press
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