It’s such a cliché,
But clichés get that way
Through veracity —
One accusing finger-pointing out,
Three coming back our way.
But does anyone follow that cliché?
The monk wrote about violent clout
That follows the finger-pointing way.
Here’s a scapegoat, there’s a scapegoat,
Everywhere there’s a scapegoat.
There is no hope following that way.
Crowds come together in the false
Community of fear faster
Than love, the monk wrote.
Thank goodness we have the one
Who became sacrificial love’s hope.
He’s the one whose yoke is easy
And whose burden is light,
Ironically, because it is the way
Away from fright and fight and flight.
Ah, to bask in eternal grace’s light
With brothers, sisters, friends of every stripe
That is our hope, the monk wrote.

*idea from a meditation by Richard Rohr
wherein he writes about the Scapegoat Mechanism,
a concept written about extensively by
Rene Girard.