Pilgrim

(Found here)

It has been years since I entered the elevator

and rode its tiny room in the direction of heaven.

I can hear it clank and murmur still, coming
from that long vertical shaft that sends us up like prayers.

It is only human to let machines do what a body might—
even to wait on it to save some small effort.

I take to the stairs instead, its shaft a ziggurat
by which I climb, incrementally, closer and closer to God,

up and up, one grey tread at a time, each grey landing
like itself and all others, the handrail a ribbon, blood red.

No virtue attends my decision to climb as I
watch the young stand near the sliding door

waiting transport, except as muscle and blood embody faith.
Were this prayer, though it is not, I would bear it myself.

~James Zoller