Prayers From the Heart:I am praying again, Awesome One.by Rainer Maria Rilke;my lord, accept me for this while by Rabindranath Tagore,/Prayer for courage by Tagore

Music:
MICHEL PEPE - Infinie Tendresse

John Atkinson Grimshaw painting

I am praying again, Awesome One.
Rainer Maria Rilke

You hear me again, as words
from the depths of me
rush toward you in the wind.

I've been scattered in pieces,
torn by conflict,
mocked by laughter,
washed down by drink.

In alleyways I sweep myself up
out of garbage and broken glass.
With my half-mouth I stammer you,
who are eternal in your symmetry.
I lift to you my half-hands
in wordless beseeching, that I may find again
the eyes with which I once beheld you.

I am a house gutted by fire
where only the guilty sometimes sleep
before the punishment that devours them
hounds them out into the open.

I am a city by the sea
sinking into a toxic tide,
I am strange to myself, as though someone unknown
had poisoned my mother as she carried me.

here in all the pieces of my shame
that now I find myself again,
I yearn to belong to something, to be contained
in an all-embracing mind that sees me
as a single thing.
I yearn to be held
in the great hands of your heart -
oh let them take me now.
Into them I place these fragments, my life,
and you, God - spend them however you want.

John Atkinson Grimshaw painting

Enlarge my heart, God,
George Appleton

Enlarge, my heart, God,
to the dimensions of your heart,
O limitless Love.
Let nothing be thought
common or unclean
which thou hast cleansed.

Let no one be thought
too exalted, so that
I only respect
but do not love.
Let nobody be regarded
as too humble, so that
I patronise or despise.

Let none be thought
as of little value
and written off,
for each is dear to Thee
with his own potential
and his own hope
and his own heartbreak.

Let me say to each with Thee,
"O man greatly beloved"
infinitely and eternally
dear to Thee.
O Lord Love,
enlarge my heart
to the dimension of Thine.

Max Nonnenbruch Art

Accept me, my lord, accept me for this while.
Let those orphaned days that passed without thee be forgotten.
Only spread this little moment wide across thy lap,
holding it under thy light.

I have wandered in pursuit of voices that drew me
yet led me nowhere.
Now let me sit in peace and listen to thy words in
the soul of my silence.

Do not turn away thy face from my heart's dark secrets, but burn them till they are alight with thy fire.
Rabindranath Tagore

Wlliam henry Margetson Art

A Prayer For Courage
Rabindranath Tagore

Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers,
But to be fearless in facing them.
Let me not beg for the stilling of my pain,
But for the heart to conquer it.
Let me not look for allies in life's battlefield,
But to my own strength.

Let me not crave in anxious fear to be saved,
But hope for the patience to win my freedom.
Grant me that I may not be a coward,
feeling your mercy in my success alone,
But let me find the grasp of your hand in my failure.