Every prayer is a sacred poem to God,
Though penned in haste on trembling air,
In fragments torn from flesh and blood,
Yet flawless in the sight of prayer.

The miser’s coin that clinks too late,
The harlot’s tear upon the floor,
The thief’s last breath beneath the weight
Of nail and spear and open door.

The scholar’s doubt that kneels at length,
The leper’s groan outside the gate,
The proud man’s silence, stripped of strength,
All enter heaven’s mercy-seat.

No line is lost, no sigh too small;
The stammered word, the wordless dread,
The broken meter of our fall
Becomes the psalm that angels read.

For He who spoke the worlds in rhyme
Delights in every ragged scroll;
He gathers every trembling line
And binds them in His heart made whole.

Therefore let fall the heart’s crude art,
Unpolished, bleeding, unafraid:
Whether the answer granted be “Yes” or a tender “No,”
Every prayer ascends as a sacred poem to the Throne of God,
For all is done in love, and the best is only given
To the child of God—no matter if the answer is yes or no.