PRAYER IS BREATH

Prayer is breath.

 

Prayer is the first breath.

It is how you are born each day,

the breath you take when you stretch

and yawn and blink away the eye-sand

left over from last night’s dreams.

 

Breath is promise.

It is commitment.

Yes, I will live today.

What is it Lord,

that You will have me

see today,

that You will have me

inhabit today,

what space have You

provided for me today,

 

whether it be sun

or whether it be rain,

whether the weather—

and sometimes we must

weather the weather—

when it greets us by lashing

out against the windows,

or hems us in with snow,

creeping up the glass,

each flake dancing

when it falls,

 

or whether it is the sun

itself, warming that same

glass, kissing the panes

with a twitch of butterfly wings,

or the thud of a bird,

who is confused

by its reflection,

and wants only to be

closer to beauty.

 

I wish I were so confused

whenever I looked in the mirror.

 

No matter the day,

I will breathe.

I will take in that breath

and hold it and remind myself

that breath is a gift,

perhaps the only gift

we both give and receive

day after day,

hour after hour,

minute after minute,

after second,

for all our lives,

because to breathe

is to live.

 

Oh, how simple it is to live.

 

Breath is how we communicate

when we don’t have words—

it is our first spoken language,

and the one that every mother

and every father immediately

recognizes from somewhere

deep inside of them—

 

Yes, yes, we spoke this language

once, in the cradle, in the stroller,

in our mother’s arms, in laughs,

and gurgles and the drool bubbles

that spilled from our mouths,

 

and in cries

when we were hungry,

when we were scared,

when we yearned for something,

and didn’t know what but wanted

someone to hold us while

we figured it out.

 

Haven’t we all cried for that

even now, long after we left

the crib and the stroller

and our mother’s arms,

haven’t we cried to be held

while we tried to figure it out,

while we tried to figure life out?

 

When I want to be held,

to feel God wrap Her arms

around me and if “her” makes

you pause then pause and sit

with it because God is more

than Father or Mother.

 

God exists beyond the words

we try and contain-constrain Her in.

 

God is not in these words.

 

Stop for second.

 

Look closely,

or listen carefully.

 

God is not in these words.

 

These words are in God

as you are in God.

 

Take a breath

and realize what it is

that you are breathing in.

 

We call it air.

We call it oxygen.

Sometimes we cough.

Sometimes we sneeze,

sometimes in early fall,

when the wind begins

to flow down from the north

like a tired river who has held

onto summer far too long,

 

we take a breath

and thank God

that the seasons do change,

that nothing lasts forever,

that what we need is

only right there, already

living in the next second,

waiting for us to get there.

 

When I need to be held,

when I need to feel God’s

arms wrapped around me,

 

what I am really saying

is that I need You, Lord,

to hold me still,

 

because life can be

so unsettling sometimes.

 

I am unsettled.

Whenever I walk,

the ground heaves

and pitches and tries

to throw me off.

 

Stop the world,

I want to get off,

someone once said—

apparently many someones

once said.

 

But I say, please God,

can You stop the world

from trying to throw

me off, because I am

here to stay.

 

And so whenever I want to

be held by God,

 

I allow the House Finch

to wake me up in the morning,

when it’s still dark,

when her voice is the only voice

and she is singing outside my window

as she builds her nest,

tends to her nest,

offering to her eggs,

a song I can only

define as love.

 

This is love

to the House Finch.

 

That she will sing

to her darling children,

who sit in darkness,

who cannot hear,

who cannot see,

whose hearts are only

just beginning to beat,

 

but they will know love

through her song

that reaches out to them

connects them, mother to child,

soul to soul for eternity.

 

The House Finch sings,

she breathes

and in that breath

is the spirit of God,

filling every living thing,

 

because sometimes we sit

in darkness and cannot see

and cannot hear anything

but the beat of our own hearts,

 

and then God begins to sing.

 

When I want to be held

by God, I take my camera

and I leave just after the House

Finch has finished her song

and I wander over around

the block to the corner

garden that sits across

from not one, but two churches.

 

One church sings with bells

on the quarter hour,

the half hour,

the whole hour

and I wonder if every

child who lives here,

and hears those bells,

somehow instinctively

knows how to tell time

and do fractions.

 

The other church sits quietly,

the garden sitting across it

on their north side.

 

The side perpetually in shadow

is the side that shows

the most life and abundance

of life, in the pollinators

that swoop in during late

summer and feast on color

and the sweet perfume

of creation.

 

But when I want to be held

by God,

 

I go to the garden.

 

It’s where it all began

and not so closed off

to us as we may think.

 

I go to the garden,

with the sun only

just barely stretching

a fingernail over

the horizon,

 

when there is fog,

when there are low clouds,

when the hawk keens

unseen from deep among

leaves of the massive oak

which shrouds the block,

 

I go to the garden

and look for the bees.

 

Some may be stirring,

those blessed bumblebees,

black and yellow furred,

if you are careful and have

the right flash and the right

lens, you can freeze one in

time and see those angel

wings, those silvery slivers

seemingly created out of nothing

but air and God’s will.

 

But I am not looking

for the flyers,

 

I am looking for the late

sleepers,

 

the ones who have ignored

the alarm clock—

oh it is too cold this morning,

I want to snuggle under

the covers—this is what the bees

do, dig themselves deeper into

the pollen, pull flower petals

over their legs and grow

still again as they sleep

for one more minute, Lord, please.

 

There are times as I walk around

in these early morning hours that

I find I am unable to breathe.

 

The things that take our breath away.

Sudden pain.

Hurt.

Sorrow.

 

But also wonder

and awe

and the feeling

that you are so very small.

 

When I lock eyes with a fawn,

still speckled white,

and eating the leaves

from fallen trees

from last night’s storm,

 

when I see her

and she sees me,

I hold my breath

because I know

that something as small

as my breath can shatter

this moment and I want

this moment to do

the impossible and last

forever, because it’s not

just the deer and me,

standing there.

 

God is there, too,

the great and holy

choreographer,

who maps the dance

of all life.

 

My life.

Your life.

 

When was the last time

you held your breath

in wonder,

 

and let it out again,

conceding that life

is more than just receiving,

right?  It is giving back, too.

 

This is how I communicate

with God, by offering my breath,

by accepting His breath of Life,

that like the water of life

and the bread of life,

is the only thing that

can keep us fulfilled

in this life.

 

This is how I pray.

Through breath.

 

This too is how I pray,

through words,

through poetry,

because all poetry

is prayer.

 

Amen.