Читать книгу Habitation of Wonder - Abigail Carroll - Страница 12

When I say I have passed the afternoon

watching loosestrife lean against the wind

at the edge of the lake, what I mean is

I have stepped into prayer, not unlike Peter

stepping out of the boat, and it has held me,

as prayer does, like a child holds a penny,

or ferns hold beads of dew. When slippage

occurs, as it is want to do, and I begin to sink

through unraveling molecules of faith like

a dream sinks back into dark when dawn

dissolves the net of sleep, I am caught by a

quiet grip, an open palm, the way air catches

a parachute or a June buttercup catches light,

and there is in that catching a new kind of

drowning, not unpleasant, though it surprises

at first. It’s like losing yourself to an embrace

in which the more you are lost, the more

surely you are found; it’s like the flood of sun

on the map of your skin, into your cells

and the spaces between your cells, sewing

you into its warmth, which, you realize,

is singing. How often have I stood at the edge

of the lake gazing, wholly unsure what it means

to pray but willing to step out, willing to go

down, slip through the watery blue particles

precisely to be caught, recovered, salvaged

again and again, to know once more that hand!