Between Prayer and the Written Word

I wish I could speak to you in silences.

In whispers I would walk towards you.

To embrace you with arms of longing,

to melt you into complete prayers.

Living words, with a flutter of wings,

wherein the Lord paused for a moment,

to sing to you in a murmur of silences and tears

emerging from an eternity in haste.

Strange words that have never been

and which the tongue of the age to come

in you to pour it all

from amphorae with living water.

But make me, Lord, Prometheus!

So that the fire desired by You

I may steal it ablaze and always share it!

For You are the One who calls, within me.

Silence – the clearest word!

The fulfillment of the mystery from the depths,

when all things are prayer

and bear prayer, beyond the lines.

So clearly I speak to you in silences,

in waves upon waves of complete silences

when I pour Heaven into your breast,

embracing you in prayer.

When inwardly I unite with the Lord and with you.

And, Lord, pour as into a chalice

Your thirst and hunger for me!

For this is why I came to steal

I, a clod of non-being and earth,

to hide the Holy Spirit in the word,

So that all Adam may nourish himself with You.

And I know You like me to be a thief of Grace,

And I like You to be a thief of me!

To flee, to escape from prose and from days,

To leave all, from all to tear myself away,

Just because I long, long for You so much.

To tear apart time that's patched up

with a thread of fleeting yarn,

so as to stealthily slip in, humbly,

in secret, the imperishable hour.

That one, measured in drops of eternity,

Which I seek to bring you as a gift now, Adam.

Receive, O man, I beg you,

and my letter brought to the altar

For in it stands tightly bound, silent and united

a humbled prayer

that awaits Resurrection as a gift!

Maria Tudor

Photography by Stratos Kalafatis / pemptousia.gr