Prayer Reflection

Life has been really hectic lately with mid year reports due and also there was the mid year exams so lots of papers to mark and then lots of comments to write.  Then my girl had her club championship today so I ended going to Sunday mass in a different parish which cater mostly to the university community.  While I was there I say this beautiful poem by Joy Cowley, a very famous author of children's books, in the weekly bulletin which I thought I'll share with you.

The Heart of Stone by Joy Cowley

There are times when I've cried out,

"God, give me back my heart of stone

and a ladder so that I can climb

up to my head and live there

with doors and windows shut on feeling.

God, God.  I'm tired of all the hurt.

For a little while, let me live

a second-hand life.  Let me tread

the safe path of other people's ideas.

Just let me  drop this awesome responsibility

you have given me, to grow

through love and pain."

Then I remember what it's like 

to exist with a heart of stone.

How cold and dead I felt inside,

and how divided the world was

when viewed without love in my heart.

Remembering, I poor myself before God

and whisper into His waiting,

"My God, there is no going back.

It has to be a soft heart,

one that is always vulnerable

to love and wounding

which is life,

which is growth,

which is You.

Keep within me, my God

the heart of flesh