At Prayer
by Barry Casey
It felt like prayer, the held-breath-
clenched-fist of guilt, those half-formed
entreaties reluctantly withdrawn
because they could not meet the bar
of “Thy will be done.” Then the helpless
fumbling, sifting phrases,
tossing them out like a man
searching for a tool in someone else’s
shed. In profile, in silhouette,
hoping to pass as one of those
prayer warriors who confronts
God and gets results.
Who could match the Psalmist,
one moment smashing up
God’s dinner party,
the next jeering at his enemies
in the name of the Most High,
all done in metered poetry.
I gave it up, embarrassed at the sound
of my thin voice, the plaintive note
of desperation, the failing guile exposed.
There are moments, though,
when words drop away like leaves,
and I, a bare branch, in silence listen.
Barry Casey is the author of Wandering, Not Lost, a collection of essays on faith, doubt, and mystery, published by Wipf and Stock (2019). His recent work has appeared in Brevity, Faculty Focus, Detroit Lit Mag, Fauxmoir, Humans of the World, Lighthouse Weekly, Mountain Views, Patheos, Pensive Journal, Rockvale Review, Spectrum Magazine, The Dewdrop, The Purpled Nail, and The Ulu Review. He holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy of Religion from Claremont Graduate University. He writes from Burtonsville, Maryland.
