Efflix 4. The God Who Never Stood

Gold over wood, an ivory face
We gave the thunder human shape
We built him higher than the room
A seated god beneath the roof
The crowd looked up I did the same
They brought him grief, they brought him names
I watched his golden fingers rest
Above the prayers we could not mend
I waited for one hand to move
For stone to tell me what to do
You never stood
So I stood up
No thunder came
No golden touch
A stranger bled outside your door
I asked the sky he needed more
When heaven stayed where we had built it
You never stood—
So I did

A mother laid her silver down
And begged you not to take her child
A soldier left his broken shield
And asked if wounds were meant to heal
We made your eyes from hammered light
Then waited for them to decide
We gave you shoulders, throne and height
Then blamed your silence for our lives
I waited for your voice to fall
But heard a wounded stranger call
You never stood
So I stood up
No thunder came
No golden touch
A stranger bled outside your door
I asked the sky he needed more
When heaven stayed where we had built it
You never stood—
So I did
Perhaps a god can show the road
Without descending from the gold
Perhaps the answer to a prayer
Is simply someone standing there
The hands that raised you toward the sky
Were never powerless or blind
We shaped a god from lifeless things
Then forgot what living hands could bring
You never stood
So we stood up
No thunder came—
We were enough
We carried strangers through your door
And asked the silent sky no more
When heaven stayed where we had built it
You never stood—
So we did

The statue kept its throne
The people carried one another home