An All-Saints Kind of Gratitude

I look back through Novemember’s
just-hanging-on leaves, the negative space
of our promises to drive through Malabar’s
winding road, taking in October’s blasts of color.
The weeks have whipped by, the leaves ignoring my
requests to stay, to never fall away, and my melancholy
drips bitter without the sweet.

Then I see our love’s first fruits hanging
on you, lying on you like so many apples,
our children’s morning sweetness, their bodies’
hard softness, wild hair, pokey elbows,
squishy bellies and meaty feet.  They grow
unconditionally from our branches, buds,
and blossoms.  They grow their own stems and leaves
and seeds and develop their own autumn flavors.

We drop away when we are ripe

thankful for what we are

what we have

and what we miss.

A Morning Resolve

I will try this day to live a simple, sincere, and serene life,
repelling promptly every thought of discontent, anxiety,
discouragement, impurity, and self-seeking; cultivating
cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and the habit of holy
silence; exercising economy in expenditure, generosity in
giving, carefulness in conversation, diligence in appointed
service, fidelity to every trust, and a childlike faith in God.
In particular I will try to be faithful in those habits of
prayer, work, study, physical exercise, eating, and sleep which
I believe the Holy Spirit has shown me to be right.
And as I cannot in my own strength do this, nor even
with a hope of success attempt it, I look to thee, O Lord
God my Father, in Jesus my Savior, and ask for the gift of
the Holy Spirit.

*Reprinted from Forward Day by Day (prayers.forwardmovement.org)