Cut The Heart

A Prelude To The Lord’s Prayer

Matthew 6:5–14

Before I start to think, before I start to speak
Before I start to weave a web of dreams around the word of God
Let me be still, let me be open.

For words are easily uttered, prayers are easily muttered
And laid aside like the wrapping of golden gifts.

Let me go inside, shut the door and close the curtains
For with you I am not afraid to be myself.
For I would bow before the figure flashing like lightning
The Earth’s full sphere in glory reigning
A Holy King forever providing.

And I would know the softest touch,
The stern rebuke, the constant thereness,
The cheek-to-cheek closeness of a loving parent.

And I would follow your footsteps
With dirty hands and an open heart.

But it is not in me to do any of these things
I cannot weld them together
I cannot force them into being
I can only honour you with silence.

So, I will be still, I will be open,
I will begin: “Our Father in Heaven … ”

Beaches

I have sat upon sharp shingle in the distant early hours
Singing on a shoreline full of cigarettes and flowers
Where sinister Chinese chip shops stay open way past three
I’ve been humbled, broken, lifted by the music of the sea.

I have sat and I have shouted in the Costa Del Somewhere
Among shrills of ghost fruit sellers, piles of dormant deckchairs,
Where dark cliffs tower my words faltered timidly,
I was humbled, broken, lifted, by the silence of the sea.

I have sat in rimming sand, seen the steelworks’ dirty flicker,
Hand in hand with my girlfriend, all alone together,
We talked about the echoes of eternal Galilee
Lost in our reflection of the love that’s in the sea.

Whatever shore I stand on, whatever lonely beach
I am searching for a fading line where sand and ocean meet.
When the memories of my footprints vanish silently
I’ll be humbled, broken lifted, by the hands that shaped the sea.