Wednesday, May 11, 2016

What happens when I pray

What happens when I pray
               ---

Whenever I try to pray
   I find myself
     (or at least, I fail to lose myself)
   distracted
      (in record time)
   by
      10,000 things

By failures and grudges
   and time tables and pay scales
   by the good and the bad and --
      well, mainly, by the ugliness that simmers behind my smiles.

And if, by chance or by grace,
   I catch myself
   as I churn through the sludge of old, tired thoughts

And if, by chance or by grace,
   I don't turn the catching into more sludge
   fodder for the curving in

then --
   sometimes --
      some precious times --
         I can have a quiet, inward chuckle at myself.

And if, by chance or by grace,
   I do
Then the churn quiets down enough
   that I can hear --
      just barely
      out of the corner of my soul's eye
God chuckling softly with me.

You see,
   prayer is a serious thing.

But God knows 
   not to take it too seriously.

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