Daughter

Based on Mark 5:21-34.

The years are bleeding, drop by drop,
and all I have just drains away.
No doctor here can make it stop,
no matter how I have to pay.

This weeping father's daughter dies
each day the more, since I was born,
but still when each day calls, I rise
to seek new healing every morn.

I'll beg, if need be—I'm not proud.
(What pride could do me any good?)
No shame will keep me from this crowd,
to touch his robes and stop the blood.

No shame, though I am all unclean
and death walks with me step by step.
Those who have nothing yet may glean,
though no one by my side has kept.

No one would reach to touch me first,
so I must grab in my own hands
the thing I hunger for and thirst:
the healing only he commands.

Oh, teacher, give me what I need:
Restore the child your Father made.
Hear me, though silently I plead,
and be the grace for which I've prayed.