My Body is a Prayer

Let me not forget
That my body is a prayer

Each step is pilgrim,
Heel, ball and toe
Moving in the sacred place
Of the earth mother.
I do not need to be
In the jungle, or the mountains,
Concrete paving is also sacred
And carries me home to prayer
If I remember.

If I do not forget
Each syllable can be a psalm
Each word a holy word
Spoken in great softness
Spoken in great kindness
Ringing in the forest
Echoed in the office.
Mantra can be spoken through me
From the fire of sacred tongue
From the chalice of my throat
From the furnace of my belly.
Mantra can be spoken through me
If I let it.

Each body breath can be danced
With the world breath, with river breath
With rock breath, with oak breath
If I do not forget.

Every touch of mine is blessing
Each reach, and each release,
Seeks contact with the holy

My actions can be blessed
If I stay home in awareness
Of my own cathedral body

My liver can be love
My lungs divine joy
My womb is also temple
Delighting in the sacred union,
Desiring soaring dance
In the divine light

Each cell of mine hums
Like a bead —in mala or in rosary,
It matters not.

My ears lay wide
To the sacred pulse of the earth
My eyes can be ripe and juicy
To the wonder and the honour
That animates each living thing

Even in the heaving horrors of this world
When sadness and anger
Squat in the marrow…
Your body is also benediction
Her voice is hymn
His heart is invocation
Their mind is sacred
Our body is prayer
Our feet are pilgrim
Our hands build temple
Our voice speaks mantra
Our spirit breaks through
To flesh and form

If we remember

Poem by

Deirdre Gleeson