header
Your Twenty-First Century Prayer Life
Nathaniel Lee Hansen (bio)

Your most frequent
requests: a safe drive,
a speedy recovery,
and financial demands.
And then of course
the old standbys
“bless this” and
"bless that.”

You wonder how
those saints master
the discipline,
their communication
traveling like currents
through crackling lines
that almost spark
from sender to
receiver, back again.

You can count
on one hand
the moments prayer
blossomed organically
without wants’ weeds
crowding petals, stealing
sunlight, robbing soil
of water, of life.

Yet, you persist
with petitions
attached to phrases
abundant, overflowing,
with me, my, and I,
forgetting that one
who wants to live
must first lose one’s life.

Nathaniel Lee Hansen

Copyright © 2019 | Valparaiso University | Privacy Policy
rose