A Prayer

I rose early, early in the morning                                                                                      

with the sky caped in black                                                                                            

the birds still asleep under the spell                                                                                  

of a cloudless, cool Spring night.

It felt easy, easy in those moments

while alone in the silent woods

absorbed in their own green growing

  to avoid being caught in the usual churn.

  I paced slow, slow by a stream like

  a serrated knife: straight on one side

  beneath a rock overhang but notched

  here, opposite, by vagaries of flow.

  O to stay long, long in those quiet moments,

  those not looked for simple gifts gone now,

  and have all that heart hoped then:

  a life well lived.