Sticker Dot Doxology

I have this reel of golden stickers
And I place them like God, the galaxies.

When I was a boy
Making delicate, deliberate offerings
I had to wait on them. Work for them.
As my teacher
Like summer skin from the shoulder,
Would peel with approval,
The shimmering circle of my becoming,
And press it upon the page, to say,
“I see you.”

***

In my lunch break,
Avoiding eye contact with the cashier,
I tap $3.50 for a roll of 100.

As offerings come to me,
Full of hope and expectation,
I mark them as I see things.

Crowned Elizabeth, her wax and signet,
My power, a planet.