Quietly, help me to clear.
Hold me in your wings
that I may trust.
In darkness, surrender.
My own way tortured.
Better, a listening prayer.
~ from ON EARTH AND IN HEAVEN poems by Gretchen Shartle
Prayer is like lying awake at night, afraid, with your head under the cover, hearing only the beating of your own heart. It is like a bird that has blundered down the flue and is caught indoors and flutters at the window panes. . . . But sometimes a prayer comes that you have not thought to pray, yet suddenly there it is and you pray it. . . . Sometimes the bird finds that what looks like an opening is an opening, and it flies away.