For When You Lose the Future You Imagined . . .

I wrote this prayer when someone I love was grieving. There was nothing I could do to help - all I could offer was my understanding that everything had changed. I’ve prayed prayers like this dozens of times.

Take what helps, leave what doesn't.

God,

What do you call
the unraveled dreams
slipping through my fingers?
And the feeling of
losing the memories
I’ll never have?

I don’t know
what to believe
about any of this.

So will you just let me
have my heartbreak
for as long as I need it?

Will you grieve with me
in the worst of it
and laugh with me
in the unexpected relief of joy
and believe with me
that it won’t always
be like this?

Help me notice
light breaking in
as uninterrupted sleep
and the comfort of quiet friends
and seemingly out of place laughter.

Help me allow myself
the experience of both -
the loss of a future I’d hoped for
and the possibility of a future
I cannot yet imagine.

I have a feeling
that if my deep grief
meets surprising hope
enough times over,
I’ll find the courage
to start again.

Eventually.

Don’t rush me there
before I’m ready;
help me notice it
when I am.

Amen.