At the altar’s edge I stand, hands laid on the trembling head,
A whisper folded into smoke, the name I cannot keep unsaid.
The priest receives the trembling gift, the hush between the breaths,
In the quiet counting of the cost, the old wound meets its death.

Blood like language, speaking what my tongue could never frame,
A mercy measured not by merit but by the One who knows my name.
Sin’s weight is lifted, not erased, but carried where it cannot stay,
What was torn is stitched again beneath the altar’s steady sway.

Not punishment alone, but passage, through the veil, a way made plain,
A promise that the broken heart may rise and learn to breathe again.
So let the smoke remind me: confession is a doorway, not a chain,
In the offering’s hush I find the courage to begin again.

People praying near an altar with candles and religious paintings inside a church
Worshippers pray and light candles at an ornate church altar.