J U N E 1 9 9 7 ![]() LEARNING HOW TO PRAYby Cathy Smith Bowers | |||||||||||||
Also by Cathy Smith Bowers: "The Entry" (1995)
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When I heard my brother was dying youngest of the six of us our lovely boy I who in matters of the spirit had been always suspect who even as a child snubbed Mama's mealtime ritual began finally to pray and fearing I would offend or miss completely the rightful target of my pleas went knocking everywhere the Buddha's huge and starry churning Shiva Vishnu Isis the worn and ragged god of Ishmael I bowed to the Druid reverence of trees to water fire and wind prayed to weather to carbon that sole link to all things this and other worldly our carbon who art in heaven prayed to rake and plow the sweet acid stench of dung to fly to the fly's soiled wing and to the soil I could not stop myself I like a nymphomaniac the dark promiscuity of my spirit there for the taking whore of my breaking heart willing to lie down with anything. Cathy Smith Bowers is the author of The Love That Ended Yesterday in Texas (1992). Copyright © 1997 by The Atlantic Monthly Company. All rights reserved. The Atlantic Monthly; June 1997; Learning How to Pray; Volume 279, No. 6; page 98. |
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