The prayer of the bone on the beach, the unprayable
Prayer at the calamitous annunciation?
- Eliot
This is prayer. The struggle. The cry of, "Kyrie Eleison!" The desperation. The return to the familiar litany, "not my will but thine be done".
I would say that I cannot pray. I fumble for words and try desperately to veer around christianese cliches; yet despite all of my attempts at eloquence, I hear the words bouncing back off the wall, reaching no ears other than my own. In trying to pray the unprayable, I am left in an uncomfortable holy silence - as silent as the grave. My words fall dead to the floor, and in the silent, devastating aftermath, I hear the voices of the saints rise up from the ages. Adding my voice to theirs I cry out - or perhaps more accurately - pathetically whisper,
"Our father, who art in heaven..."