At every beginning
bless our dreaming
and our doing.
This day (week, month, year) lies before us,
full of the mundane and the miraculous,
the known and the unknown.
Be the breath we take before each step.
Be the source from which we draw strength.
Be the end toward which we direct our hope.
Open our eyes to all that is around us.
Open our ears to the song the soul yearns to sing.
Open our hearts to the love that lives through us,
Open our hands to the task the moment requires.
Let us do the one thing,
the thing before us,
as if all creation
and out very life
depend upon it,
as if You are bent over,
watching and listening
and willing us
to do it well.
--Carla A. Grosch-Miller, from Psalms Redux: Poems and Prayers, 2017
Sheltering God,
I hide myself in You.
Head swathed and bowed,
I listen for the still, small voice.
Strengthening God,
in times of tumult and terror,
as the earth moves
and the horizon shifts,
You call me back,
to shelter and to strengthen.
Your song is in the sighing of trees.
Your light is in flicker and spark,
knowing and unknowing.
Your power is in the greening,
and in its passing.
Those with ears to hear, listen.
Those with eyes to see, look.
War and peace,
trembling and tenderness,
all that we create
and all that we destroy
hold a holiness
we do not understand.
Illumine our being,
that our doing
might manifest You.
--Carla A. Grosch-Miller, British theologian and pastor, from Psalms Redux: Poems and Prayers, 2014
