Last night’s yearning to be a “non-anxious presence” leads me to offer my psalm for last Sunday. Peace be with us all.

Mother God,
I am feeling tossed by the ferment
of men thrashing around in my small lake,
upsetting my vessel,
commandeering it on a Zimbabwe road,
steering it from a secret church committee,
upending it with their loud philosophizing.

Yours is a “still, small voice,” indeed,
I hear speaking to the waves I fear
as I am powerless in the wake:
“Peace. Be still.”

I hope you have the whole world in your hands.
But I fear that, for the moment,
you are holding those who are reborn.
We are your unlikely brood,
crammed on the kayak of your church,
like the grandkids headed for the beach:
some trailing along in life jackets
or trying to swim it on their own,
an armada of babies
awaiting
the next huge man to rock us with a cannonball.

Your voice seems small, indeed,
if I only want a foghorn in a murky world.
Teach me to rest in your arms,
in you: my life jacket, my Nana,
my strangely unsinkable boat,
my peace, among the waves.