Prayer

Bless my life - its inks
and paperweights and houseplants
fringed with sun.
Give me the quiet, Lord,
I close my eyes
and turn my tongue back for.
Don't feed me too much,
and when I can't decide between love
and what's jammed in the typewriter
or roughed out on the drawing board,
take away the coins I flip
and make me listen: That young man
smiling in my kitchen at me is in love.
With me. That's one door in my house
that opens on more than grief
or dirty sheets or the supermarket
twice a week. It gives on light,
and I, your moth, am beating to get in.
Give us this day, and with no promises
but what we are - two small people
trying to be one - send us out
and say, "That's fine. Light fills your gaps.
Breathe on."

by Carolyne Wright