Limbo

This is my story about the Jesus who is still Familiar
even when stranger. Jesus the household name of my upbringing,
and, unlike you, not the curse but the prayer,
lifted on the shoulders of candle smoke in the quiet

This is my story about the Nobody that answers, the silence
that replies in the red prayer book, at my bedside.

And you ask me to pray over dinner and I am afraid
becuase I think He might hear and Respond,
though rarely responds,
to me.

Must be waiting for a something--More than just the praying--
that is a Doing, is not the meaningless (redbook, candlelight,
alleluiah, amen).

I cannot hear you when you breathe,
I am shouting, and He says,

You are a whisper, to me.