I take a deep breath

I take a deep breath
and slowly
ever so slowly
let it go.

I feel it seeping
into my flailing limbs
coursing through my doing
bubbling through my brain.

It is content
to distribute itself as it pleases
to go where it wants
at its own pace.

No anxious breath has this capacity. 
No! that breath screams to be released.
Forces its way out.
Gasps for more.

This breath is not that breath.

This breath is patient,
satisfied
dignified
content with its status.

This breath makes no demands
except, as it were,
when it has run its course,
and has supplied my need.

And now I need another.

This deep breath 
exits slowly
without fanfare
making way for the next.

I do not thank this breath
do not consider its significance
its magnificence
its wonder.

I simply take another
and another
as if I was made for this
and it for me

As if it would go on forever
as if I would.

Grate.....full.....
 

Breath of Creation

A million lights twinkle above me in constellations I once knew. Bright lights from bodies trillions of miles away scatter the early morning darkness. I whirl in wonder at their glorious display.

How, O Lord, can I fail to believe you are here?

My feet, rooted in dust and dirt, are heavy in the sand of time, in the gnarled root of twisted words and weighty worries. It bends me and pulls me down, insisting I pay attention. I fall again and again at my own feet.

How, O Lord, can I believe you are here?

Is there another? Another who reaches and falls, reaches and falls, as I do this day? My expiration, she inspires? His expiration, I inspire? Do we, together, breathe the universe?

How, O Lord, could we not believe, if we knew one another?

In a breath, out a prayer

 *As you inhale, breathe in God’s love. As you exhale,
let go of anything blocking that love. . . . .

Cool.
Crisp.
Moist.

Expansive
Stretching
Full

Hold it
Hold it
Can’t.
Won’t.
Must!

Hissssss
His.

* Karla M. Kincannon, in Creativity and Divine Surprise.