Evening Prayer

By Lavina Fielding

“If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,”

The old Jews prayed, “Let my right hand forget …”

I had done worse. I had forgotten life, light, food,

Sunlight and song: I had forgotten thee.

The day had dragged me in its wake.

My heart, long-hardened, barely felt

A kind of restlessness that brought me back.

Back where? I hardly knew.

The memory of a memory told me “home.”

With little faith and less of hope I came

And knelt beneath the weight of guilt—

The little lies, the swift unkindnesses,

The tasks left incomplete—

But I knelt too beneath thy hands:

The hands that freed me, and made whole

The fragments of a heart I did not know was broken.

I must go out again by morning light.

But this time, Lord, I think I will remember:

I go upon thy errand

And I know

The way back home.