Poquette has a bachelor's degree in English and specializes in writing about literature. In the following essay, Poquette discusses Dennis's use of point of view and imagery to explore free will and predetermination in the poem.

Dennis's "The God Who Loves You" is a poem that yanks readers around emotionally. By addressing the poem directly to the reader, the reader is pulled into the hypothetical situation that Dennis creates, where the reader is both made to feel sad that he—for the purposes of the poem, Dennis addresses the poem to a male reader—could have had a better life and also guilty because the reader is causing an unnamed, omnipotent god pain by not following the path that would have led to this better life. Dennis achieves this emotional roller coaster through careful use of both point of view and realistic imagery.

When the poem begins...