Praying

Tonight, after quiet visits to a number of local parishes for Eucharistic Adoration, I was reminded of a poem I composed for Holy Thursday three years ago. Though I don't quite feel the consolation and vitality I did in spring of 2008, these words still ring true to me.

We've washed, we've eaten.

Walking out into the darkness,

the Lord seeks our company

for a less gleeful sharing.

And so we seek him,

journeying from church to church,

faithful havens we often pass

in our hurried lives.

Each a modern Gethsemane

in a city honoring a saint

yet abounding in valleys

of gloom, despair, and tears.

No longer bread and wine,

now it is glorified flesh

and a cup of blood whose

fearfulness we can never know.

Spirits hover in darkened vaults

while cassocked seminarians,

and plainclothes religious,

and sacred laity pray together.

Lost in one way or another,

found here on their knees,

inclining toward a troubled light

still needed beyond the door.