Waiting 2: Hagar

I was not born to choose.
From the very start they told me,
"Go here, do this, take that."
So it was no big step (I told myself)
when my mistress said,
"Go to your master's bed.
Give him a son. I can't."

I was not taught to say, "I won't",
never heard the word violate,
nor how a body was not 
like a room that a master owned.
No-one told me that the master's god
was not like men, did not demand
my agony to keep his word,
moved in mysterious ways, it's true,
but never in deceit.

So, when this child proved
the one thing I could call mine, I tugged 
this small thread of a rope to pull me up.
When it snapped, I ran, taking 
charge of my feet when I owned nothing else.
And when, placeless, I hid,
He called, this god I'd never known,
He called me by my name,
and that voice was a hand scooping,
sheltering me.

So I named Him, not knowing
what to call a God like Him, and no
words for this wonder besides
these that burst like laughter from me:
You are the God who sees me.

I can't
recall what happened next.
History took its turns that you now know.
I was a detour, yet grace, I've learnt, 
loves detours. And one day, I'm sure,
the path that strayed to meet me,
will open wide as a vast, loving Way,
and detours will be as highways
on that day.