Daniel 3 by Courtney Moody

It’s like pure Sheol on our faces.
We knew this would be our destiny:
to have blood melted, skin crisped—
but we would not use unkissed lips
and golden words to build an idol.
We refused to throw this king past
the stars and shriek like a volcano,
and now we’re reserved to eat its lava.
Our only shield in this smoked battle
are prayers from the lips that sent
us here by refusing to burst or crack.
And so they throw us into this oven
like bread, with our blood for leaven!

How strange—our skin remains
cool as an autumn day in the fields.
Our feet shiver more than a bath of
nighttime desert sand between toes.
And how strange—God played math,
added a fourth to our sorrows, who
brought a laughter that overtakes
the crackling wood and vanishes like
a candle when they fish us out and
fall on their knees, lips breaking
into a song that was only our own.
How strange a furnace turned this land
of foreigners into a home without ashes!

Courtney Moody is an Honor Medallion graduate of the University of Central Florida with a BA in creative writing. In 2021, her poem "In Defense of the Fur" was the 2nd Honorable Mention for The Margo Award from the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. More of her work can be found in YellowJacket Press’ Chasing Light, Bluffton University’s Bridgejournal, and Capsule Stories’ Starry Nights.