Prayer

Trees and soil pray with wind

and if there’s no wind, they pray 

with stillness. If they are unmoved, 

they are closer to themselves. 

Wind prays in stillness to find its shape 

and prays in tree branches to hear 

the harp strings of winter, prays 

in ground leaves to shake the land, 

prays in green buds to awaken

the cardinal, for color to bloom 

a spirit of life out of Earth 

in places where my face is not known, 

where I tiptoe upon the rock 

of mountains who are in constant prayer 

to sky and sun. The sun prays to darkness, 

realizing it cannot see everything 

in the light. In the heaven of goodwill, 

of humility, and of compassion, 

our own begging becomes a rhythm 

of prayer, divine like a being who prays 

through their very existence, a prayer 

embodying form, movements, 

and one’s entire being, in the lungs 

and on the lips. No knuckles, 

no fingers, manicured or callused, 

can pry through this faith, these prayers, 

how they are lived, how they are voiced 

like the trees, soil, and wind.

-Liza Wolff-Francis