We do not have Pharaoh’s excuse, 
whose heart by God was hardened, 
but from that evening in the garden 
we have pursued our own destruction. 

We cannot claim we didn’t know, 
with the fruit still sweet on our tongue. 
Was it necessary? Better ask the serpent,
ask ourselves what it would have taken to remain 
unstained by the sap and its syrupy lies? 

God who hardened Pharaoh’s heart but not ours; 
God who split the earth, poured out its dead, 
did you crack even then this heart of stone? 
Like a shell cracking open to reveal 
the seed within of good or evil, 
weal or woe, war or sweet desire.