To Watch The World In Flower And To Pray Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

spending half a lifetime just to understand
whatever they call history
is not what you had planned
and what's the difference really
when no matter where you start
you're only going to really know
the lines that are your part
in the scheme of it all
the scheme of it all
it isnt summer board games
after you leave school
no one to tell you really
what on earth to do
you find by going
or you find by staying home
that only God is with you
when you're all alone
I hope you did.
there is no map to tell you
when the things you knew are gone
where they went or why they went
you just go on
the time you thought you had
was so much shorter than you knew
but no one then could tell you that
that you would listen to
you care less for history
than you did then
it's your history now
that's giving you a spin
and where you'll be tomorrow
or where you were back then
seems to fade and day by day
you think, well, I have been
grateful just to be here
walking under stars
feeling happy as a child
in the old backyard
looking into raindrops
like prisms to the sun
feeling, dreaming, being here
to run the race you've run
it doesnt really matter what the history books say
it's a privilege to be here
in yet another May
to watch the world in flower
and to pray.

mary angela douglas 16 may 2023