.

Blessings

Every now and then when I’m in prayer
I feel Your famous joyfulness descend.
It doesn’t descend, of course; it’s always there
Waiting for us, just as it’s always been.

It doesn’t happen often, just enough
To keep me moving toward You. I had come
To think I finally understood Your love.
But that was wrong. I had barely begun.

Today’s news about the murdered child
Hardly moved me—such things are common here—
Till for an instant, a timeless little while,
You let me feel the grief You always bear.

What greater blessing than to feel Your bliss?
To feel Your pain and count myself as blessed.

.

.

Adrian Fillion, a retired proofreader, lives in Lawrenceville, Georgia. He won the 2018 Ron Boggs Memorial Poetry Contest, hosted by the Johns Creek Poetry Group in Johns Creek, Georgia. Several of his poems have appeared in small, local publications.

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4 Responses

  1. jd

    A lovely poem about a word thrown around repeatedly, at least by yours truly. You have provided some excellent filler for it. One small nit – I would have loved a rhyme in the final line. Nevertheless, I would be glad to have written this poem.

    Reply
  4. Margaret Coats

    That’s a wonderful question-and-answer couplet, Adrian. The imperfect rhyme seems to emphasize the contrast of ideas. My suggestion about your poem would be to regularize meter to suit word accent in lines 8 and 9–although that’s the turn where an unusual effect can fit. For line 9, five stresses could be heard more easily with the simple addition of a comma after “news,” and another at the end of the line.

    Reply

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