We aspire through the medium of flowers
And on the marble coping lay our prayers
Attending not the minutes nor the hours
Or all the pressing needs of life's affairs.
We kneel and raise our fragrant offerings
Solemnly among the incense spires
And ask in human ways for human things
Healing of the ill, the heart's desires,
Decent of peace into our fractured breasts
Or strength to face finalities of fate.
In a hundred tongues our calls like fiery crests
Arise and in each body re-create
The plenary consecration and the Flame
To lift the spirit on devotion's wings,
In every form and face invoke the Name,
The Presence that a true surrender brings.
We dwell in that pellucid atmosphere
Free from the burden of the ages' toil
In silence rapt the mystic voice to hear
And God's soft tread upon our mortal soil.
First published in Mother India - August 2003