Sometimes when I intend to pray I don't so much pray as dutifully get the job done, like drying dishes or washing the car.
Other times life is overloaded with stuff to do and prayer becomes one of those things I do while doing other things, prayer as multi-tasking and God given a percentage of my attention.
Or under pressure send God a text, U R my 4tress[ ]
Then feeling guilty because I don't pray properly (what would a proper prayer sound like) I come across a poem like this and realise again, prayer isn't calibrated on my pious thoughts and wayward intentionality. Prayer is paying attention, in those moments when God is present, and I notice.
Spectrum
A little window, eastward, low, obscure,
A flask of water on the vestry press,
A ray of sunshine through a fretted door,
And myself kneeling in live quietness:
Heaven's brightness was then gathered in the glass,
Marshalled and analysed, as one by one
In terms of fire I saw the colours pass,
Each in its proper beauty, while the sun
Made his dear daughter Light sing her own praise.
(As Wisdom may, who is a mode of light),
Counting her seven great jewels: then those rays
Remerged in the whole diamond, total sight.
The globe revolved subservient: that just star
Whirled in his place; water and glass obeyed
The laws appointed; with them, yet how far
From their perfection, I still knelt and prayed.
(Ruth Pitter, Collected Poems, page 370)
The window is the Daily Bread window in Durham Cathedral, gifted by the staff of Marks and Spencers in Durham. Those who have been in my College study will recognise it. I did a stranded cotton tapestry of this years ago, and the vivid, vibrant, vital colours are themselves a form of praise. The poem is one of my favourites from Ruth Pitter.
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