Insha'Allah, if’n the Crick Don’t Rise:

Prayer of the Heart for the Victims of 9/11 both Living and Dead

Someday
we will all
unplug our televisions
and shut down our computers
at the same time.

We’ll turn out all the lights
before going outside
to see if we can still find
the Milky Way.

There’s always enough light
for everyone,
if no one
hides their own shining.

Someday
we will all go quiet
at the same time
under a bright diamond
midnight sky
just like tonight’s.

In Yahweh’s sacred presence,
by Allah the merciful and just,
in submission to
the Compassionate One,
the God Who is Love,
in the sight of
all that is holy and just
and wholly true,
in the name of Moses,
Jesus and Mohammed
(peace be upon them all),
may justice reign,
forgiveness bloom,
vision reveal
one mind shared,
the same Being we extend,
this single healing light
that neither time nor space obstructs.

Light-Seeking Missives

Airborne ambient piezoelectric
backyard mindfulness bells
rising falling
crescendo fade.

The impossibly winged buzz
of hummingbirds approaching
receding rising diving
straight down
blazing tiny kamikazes
pull out at the last
possible moment
like that time when I was
decades younger and more foolish
with my girlfriend
when her parents were
unexpectedly away
for the weekend,
but I’m not
going to talk about that
here,
so you can relax.

Suffice it to say that
love appears in many forms,
goes beyond them all,
falls into a single
confluence of histories,
cascades over the same one
waterfall of grace that feeds
each man woman and child.

A leaf of clover
breaks through dark tar
at road’s end,
cracks it
from below.

In an instant,
it’s bright for the first time
on a single stretch of new green,
blue-sky nude and warm,
baptized by a breeze.