On Being Told Prayer Is a Crutch
So what if it is?
Clear days, I understand it,
molecules scatter azure
light from an in-his-feelings-
sun, that’s why
the sky is blue. We know
too much, or want to.
Not the Bible, but the i-
Phone tells us so.
Devotion doesn’t work
that way, but it does. Not
the path, per se, for me
though, a trail back to grace-
fully living with one’s light
shone toward higher
axioms than I
can presently see.
It’s the immediacy
of a just-thought
thought, thundering
into a device
of my own decided making,
prayer. You know it as Siri.
I call it instant intimacy.
From Silencer (Mariner Books, 2017). Copyright © 2017 by Marcus Wicker. Used with permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.