Unsuspected Mercies
The world is full of unsuspected mercies: an orange’s skin peels off in one long piece and fills the room with scent like sunlight bursting between the blinds when darkness wouldn’t cease; a voice that mourns for war and hopes for peace sings promise as a drink in desert thirsting; a chord that gathered tension is releasing, is letting go a note I held too long; the words don’t come, and then they come so easy, and everything goes right that had been wrong; where there was silence now there is a song that fills the room, and everybody sings it; a table where we savor the belonging— PB&Js or flights of elegance— when coffee’s brewing everyone comes thronging, with madeleines so good that Proust makes sense, and prayers arise that break down every fence, and out past those there is a new day dawning; the morning comes, but comes upon you gently (you thought new heavens and a brand-new earth would need a cataclysm, but they’re sent here each time a seed awakens in the dirt) and mercy is made new, and all our thirst is satisfied by sips from heaven’s wellspring.
Dance when the sun comes up By Vardhini reddy - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=128268821
This piece comes from my time spent in Virginia last weekend on a songwriting retreat with the Porter’s Gate for the daily prayer app, Pray As You Go. You can see pictures here.



"madeleines so good that Proust makes sense" – those must be some dang good madeleines! Love that line.
Well done, Kate!