Isaac by Ross Gay Lyrics

There were six things I saw on the way. A grasshopper twirling through
the dust. A cattail's neck snapped. A rock broke open to blood-red
quartz. Hoofprints. A red-breasted blackbird singing in a cluster of
fig trees, the cluster like a clutch of hands. Though my father's hand
wrapped around my wrist kept it quick.

And then his hand around my neck and drawing a blade and looking
at the sky with my face pressed against the rock. And for millennia an
angel sent by God to stay the hand.

When my father drew me into his arms, the tears and snot gathering
in his beard, I saw my brother riding his horse down the rock-strewn
path. I saw him slide the arrow in his quiver and never look back.

I have news for you. The fathers are lying. They can't help themselves.