Sunday Things: Prayers on 9/11

Annette Marie Hyder

When I think of people around the world
in temples, mosques, cathedrals and fields
sending their prayers — like children running
up a mountain slope
like paper lanterns filled with flame
lifting against a dark sky
like joyous shouts and the most lowly of lamentations
braided into a Rapunzel braid or a flying carpet
with which to ascend the heavens
and see the breaths of so many exhaled in a wish for good
blowing out, not a million birthday candles but, a myriad acts of violence
it seems to me that the final word of such supplication
culminating into one bright spirit of morning
and the dawning of a new day
is Amen.

Links of interest:
Daily Herald Gallery: Honoring 9/11 around the world
CNN: World finds unique ways to mark 9/11 anniversary
Catholic Encyclopedia: Amen 

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The airplane —

Annette Marie Hyder

that big eater of happiness
swallowed you in one gulp
and flew away with you in its belly.
That big “now you see it, now you don’t” prestidigitator
parlor-tricked you out of sight

but even worse
is that it didn’t have me for dessert
or put me into the big black top hat of the sky
to be pulled out like a rabbit
by sleight of hand trick
to land me next to you —
the most beautiful bird ever
made out of a magician’s white scarf.

Keep talking

Annette Marie Hyder

Awash in the whitecaps
of your words
my resistance is a fleet
of paper boats
that sinks
gently unfolding like a sigh
or a whisper told under water.
My boats drift to the bottomless depths
lost in a sea of persuasion.