Prayers

 

“Remove, let’s say, prayers from actual existence in the world; make it so that my tongue, my mind has unlearned the words and the very act of praying—so that I could not, and people could not pray anymore. And I would run goggle-eyed and with hideous shrieks out of the house and would run and run until I dropped. Without prayer life is totally impossible . . . Without prayer life’s all madness and horror.”

Vas. Vas. Rozanov, Solitaria

 

A Prayer of Healing and Last Rites Prayer

Lord, gaze with eyes of compassion, during this, the Time of the Great Plague, upon thy servant [name], grant unto him/her the healing of the mind, the healing of the body, the healing of the spirit. Restore unto her/him [name] the fullness and the wholeness as it was when he/she was created.

 May the Lord bless you and keep you, may the Lord let his face shine upon you and be gracious unto you. May the Lord look upon you with kindness and beneficence, may the Lord grant you peace. As the Lord didst heal the sick by touch, so do I, the acolyte of the Lord, now lay hands upon you [name], anointing you with the oil of rejoicing for the healing of your mind, body, spirit, soul.

 And if such healing is not to be, I anoint you [name] with the oil of rejoicing in a life now lived through, and with the oil of acceptance of the end of that life and the beginning of a new existence for [name], in that place where we all once were before coming into being, and whither we all must return. Amen.

 

PRAYERS ON THE SUBJECT OF BEING AND NONBEING

Prayer of Gratefulness Before Conception

Thank you, Lord, for conjuring the forces that will propel me, for a brief time of being, into being. And thank you for the hallowed nonbeing in which I’ve been and will be again.

 Prayer of Gratefulness While Alive

Thank you, Lord, for letting me be, for the time being, in being.

Prayer of Gratefulness After Death

Thank you, Lord, for having let me be, for a brief time being, in being. And thank you for the blessed nonbeing into which I’ve returned.

Prayer of Gratefulness By Creatures Never To Be Conceived

(And Therefore Never to Be)

Thank you, Lord, for letting me be in nonbeing, for being in nonbeing is simply a different way of being in being. The beatitude of nonbeing, in fact, may well be a better place to be.

Prayer of Supplication By Creatures Who Suffer Overmuch From Being

Take me, Lord. Take me back into the pullulating succor of nonbeing.

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[All passages above excerpted from the book, Here We Be. Where Be We?]