The First Morning

This is a place to pray.

I place “where prayer has been valid”*

Here there is an ache in the ribcage,

And against the throat, and in the pit of the stomach.

An ache of loss, and suffering, and resilience, through a battering,

Like the cold gray swells that that pound against the coast.

Even the young, greening trees are hushed into reverence in the morning,

They sway meekly, afraid to make a sound.

The threefold white of the sea and the sky and the mist in the dawning air hallows the room so early, that there is little chance of sleeping late. But I am satisfied with a rest no sleep could give.

A rain begins,

Pattering on the left-side panes,

Blending into a rhythm on the lawn.

The night is gone.

An un-met future awaits me.

The un-wet rocks are not convinced that my pleasure in them warrants my acceptance.

But there is little that cannot be worn away

By patient love.

*T.S. Eliot, The Four Quartets: Little Gidding