Hands Loosely Folded In Prayer

Hands loosely folded in prayer
Thumbs touch, resting like lover’s heads
He below, she leaning in, shared
Wonderment in the flowerbed’s
Soft pillow, the day above in blue
And should the night roll right around
Like a counterweight, the view
Of heaven’s host of lights be found.

Hands loosely folded in prayer
Lips want to kiss the cool thumbnails
Two half-moons under shiny veils
And nostrils rest and draw upon
The air and light from father, son,
One hand the parent to the other
The space they share, theirs discovered
A place for holy spirit there.

Hands loosely folded in prayer
Fingertips touch the mountainous knuckles
Like unborn children’s heads to knees.
Before the bosom, one’s childhood suckles
Upon itself in dreaming seas
And so the hands become a womb
Enfolded spirals like seashell rooms
Breath at the foot of the stairs.

Hands loosely folded in prayer
Fingers make furrows across a mound
A fertile world, two roots going down
To elbows anchored near the hips
The space between where eyes like ships
Approaching a bright new world explore
The fissures leading to the core
The fecund treasure there.

Hands loosely folded in prayer
The folded fingers a double roof
The heels of palms the floor, the hooves
Of goats that press on angled walls
Starlight streaming above the stalls
Thumbs move now from lips to forehead
Third eye the star that sees the bed
And the baby cradled there.

18 - 11- 2010