Weep and Pray
Just for today, weep and pray,
And do not say it is useless, pathetic, stupid.
Just for now, this moment, let yourself stay
In touch with how it is to be here, now,
Alive, on this planet, hurting.
Just for today, do not run away.
Let tears slip along the grooves
Worn by losses intimately known,
And do not judge.
All griefs are one grief,
All tears are the ocean.
Open up, permit, let be.
Allow pain to swell the size of suffering all.
Let yourself weep, even though
You cannot see the value in it.
The heart that breaks can contain the world,
And today you can feel humanity
Crying in your heart, so weeping is your work.
Just for today, let yourself
Weep and pray.
Today is a day when you know what it is
To watch your baby starve
Slowly. The sad eyes grown huge, closing.
Know the time it takes to realise
The little flutter is fluttering no more,
So no-one will ever know who they were.
Do not say you do not know,
You have not been to such places.
The pain you know is the pain we all hold,
This knowing dwells in our hearts
For all we seek to escape it.
Weep and pray. It's enough for today.
You are blessed to have this time
To let your tears fall for us all.
You are blessed to be here now,
Even if all you can do is allow
Yourself reach out and touch
Gently with your thought
All the pain that's held in the world.
The raped and tortured, crippled and murdered,
Are reason enough that just for today
You allow yourself to weep and pray.
And because you are where you are
Take it one step further:
Open your heart beyond those who are easy
To embrace in love and honour in tears -
To the boys who drop the bombs
As well as the people they drop them on;
The businessmen who spend their working hours
Designing instruments to torture others,
And those who find their use a pleasure.
The sadistic and cruel, the tormentors and killers
Are family too and so you include them.
Weep, that they are the way they are.
Pray that something might change them.
And now you've looked at the way the world is,
Let the whole world rest within your heart.
Honour your willingness to look at the truth
Of the consequences of our choice not to look.
Return to your griefs familiar grooves -
See how softly they now sit
Within the heart's breaking
And forgive yourself.
Let every tear become a prayer
That hearts may heal everywhere.
Learn to see this "being with"
Is your offering, is your gift.
And it is okay than just for today
It is your turn to weep and pray.