(yours is the day)

Yours oh Lord is the day and yours the night,
and the stale end of winter, the sky like wet newspaper.
Yours the disputed city and the woman with her arm flung
running for the water. Yours the morning news.
Lord you fix the gates of the firmament and set the stars
on wheels. You split the waters to our need,
you open doors. Lord you get up before dawn,
you put on slippers, feed the cat and grind the coffee. For you
it is always morning. You pick up the papers, you read
all the mail. Your day is always opening. You always
have time. Oh I need so much from you. The dust is getting grimy,
there are ten loads of laundry. No poems will come
except this one, and I feel silly. I have bills to pay,
oh Lord, and not much money, though I have never been hungry.
Yours, oh Lord, is the discount grocery, the day-old bread,
the bagged bulk peppers, and all my neighbours, the woman in the blue chadori
who doesn't want my prayers. Yours oh Lord are winter apples, onions,
and especially potatoes. Everything is yours -- aspirin, arthritis,
the ache of late winter, the fearless crocus. What does that teach us?
For I am not fearless. I sit through the day at my desk
swamped in nothing, not writing, twisting and hopeless, and the rain
turns to sleet, then snow. The whole world slowly changes me
until it's beautiful. I put on Miles Davis and you
are the pause, the empty note, the hanging silence.
Lord, remember the dove of your people. I am caught
and throwing myself against the window and I want to be
a sparrow, my wings in your hand, and the door opening --

***
Psalm 74