Tag Archive for "home" | To Bend Light

Posts Tagged ‘home’

One-by-One: A Prayer as the COVID Death Toll Mounts

Posted on: May 27th, 2020 by Alden

The U.S. death toll from COVID-19 is approaching 100,000, as the world-wide death toll surpasses 350,000. This prayer was written at the request of the Central Conference of American Rabbis in an effort to remember and mourn those lost hearts and souls as the U.S. marks this sad milestone.

ADDENDUM: As of February 17, 2021, the U.S. death toll surpassed 500,000 and total deaths world-wide are nearing 2.5 million people.

One-by-One: A Prayer as the COVID Death Toll Mounts
God of consolation,
Surely you count in heaven,
Just as we count here on earth,
In shock and in sorrow,
The souls sent back to You,
One-by-one,
The dead from the COVID pandemic,
As the ones become tens,
The tens become hundreds,
The hundreds become thousands,
The thousands become ten-thousands
And then hundred-thousands,
Each soul, a heartbreak,
Each soul, a life denied.

God of wisdom,
Surely in the halls of divine justice
You are assembling the courts,
Calling witnesses to testify,
To proclaim
The compassion of some
And the callousness of others
As we’ve struggled to cope.
The souls taken too soon,
Whose funerals were lonely,
Who didn’t need to die,
Who died alone,
Will tell their stories
When You judge
Our triumphs
And our failures
In these hours of need.

God of healing,
Put an end to this pandemic,
And all illness and disease.
Bless those who stand in service to humanity.
Bless those who grieve.
Bless the dead,
So that their souls are bound up in the bond of life eternal.
And grant those still afflicted
With disease or trauma
A completed and lasting healing,
One-by-one,
Until suffering ceases,
And we can stop counting the dead,
In heaven
And on earth.

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Postscript: My other coronavirus prayers are: “Sheltering in Place,” “On the Front Lines of the Pandemic,” “Healing from Coronavirus“, “Coronavirus: A Prayer for Medical Scientists” and “Traveler’s Prayer in a Time of Pandemic.”

Please check out my ELItalk video, “Falling in Love with Prayer,” and my two CCAR Press books: This Joyous Soul: A New Voice for Ancient Yearnings and This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day. For reprint permissions and usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” To receive my latest prayers via email, please subscribe (on the home page). You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Source: The New York Times, May 24, 2020

The Blessing of Faces: A Zoom Prayer

Posted on: March 30th, 2020 by Alden

This prayer is inspired by the array of faces of men I love on a Zoom call. It is, in fact, a poetic version of the blessing that Steve Stanley — a ritual elder in the ManKind Project — gave to the men of ManKind Project Israel on our first virtual Community Tent, a meeting of all MKP Israel men. The idea is his; the words are (mostly) mine. Use this prayer to open Zoom calls. This is my second prayer inspired by the new reality of living with coronavirus. The first is called “Sheltering in Place.” Links to my health-related coronavirus prayers are below.

The Blessing of Faces
So many beautiful faces,
So many radiant souls,
Shining forth
Into our hearts.

Look at those eyes.
The smiles.
The hopes. The fears.
The yearning. The questioning.
The compassion.
The love.

Take it in.
Take it all in.
The tenderness.
The humanity.
The blessing of faces
Arrayed before you.
The blessing of faces,
Given,
And received.

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Photo Source: Zoom Help Center

Sheltering in Place

Posted on: March 29th, 2020 by Alden

In this strange and uncertain new era of COVID-19, here’s a prayer of gratitude and hope for our time sheltering in place. May we all know health and safety.

Sheltering in Place
May it be Your will,
G-d of our fathers and mothers,
That our sheltering in place
Be for health and healing,
Longevity and life,
Sustenance, renewal and love.
Let our best selves shine forth
In these moments of uncertainty,
These moments of unfamiliar distances,
These moments that may yield stress or conflict,
Confusion or despair.
Let peace arise inside us.
Let kindness flow between us.
Let deliverance rise up from heaven,
And let health and goodwill radiate throughout the world
As a river of blessings.

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Postscript: My other coronavirus prayers are: “On the Front Lines of the Pandemic,” “Healing from Coronavirus“, “Coronavirus: A Prayer for Medical Scientists” and “Traveler’s Prayer in a Time of Pandemic.”

For Creating a Home

Posted on: February 1st, 2018 by Alden

This is a prayer about the spiritual aspects of creating a home. It can be used from the moment one conceives of the idea of creating a new home until the feeling arrives that the home space is complete. It can also be used as a meditation before affixing a mezuzah to the front door — or any door — of the home.

For Creating a Home
G-d of our mothers and fathers,
Look with kindness on me/us as I/we
Create a new home,
An expression of love.
Let me/us build a place of laughter and delight,
Where Torah guides me/us
And acts of righteousness and charity begin.
Let this be a refuge and a shelter,
An oasis of joy and celebration,
Where friends and family
Are drawn together by a deep sense of welcome,
And a haven of generations
Where we gather to honor each other.

Bless this home,
And all who enter,
With love, contentment and peace.

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Postscript: Here’s a prayer to be said “Before Moving” and a prayer for “Quiet.”

Please check out my ELItalk video, “Falling in Love with Prayer,” and This Grateful Heart: Psalms and Prayers for a New Day. For reprint permissions and usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” To receive my latest prayers via email, please subscribe (on the home page). You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Photo Source: Moreshet Auction House

Oh You Hills, Oh You Sands

Posted on: January 8th, 2012 by tobendlight

I wrote this after meditating on the sand dunes of the Arava, a rift valley in the southern Negev. The meditation was led by staff from Kibbutz Ketura and Ben Gurion University. The assignment: go off in silence to think about the desert and what it evokes. Then, after 20 minutes, write about it. To listen along, click on the triangle in the bar below. The text follows.

Oh You Hills, Oh You Sands
Speak to me
Oh you hills.
Did my father pass this way?
Did my mother draw water
From some secret well?
Did I dream of angels and blessings?
Or will the man I am
Wrestle all night
With the man
I am yet to be?

Speak to me
Oh you sands.
What ancient beauty have you captured?
What silent yearning springs up
To water my heart?
What treasures do you
Still hold dear?

Let me know the music of your valleys.
Let me hear the heart beat
Beneath your thousand stones.
Let me remember
The ancient promise of home.

Speak to me
From the place where
Desert and sky meet
In perfect silence,
In perfect wisdom,
In perfect love.

Postscript: Here are additional prayers about Israel. For the sticklers among you, this photo was taken in Nachal Peres in the Negev near Masada, not in the Arava.

Photo credit: Alden Solovy

The Way Home

Posted on: June 30th, 2011 by tobendlight

This is prayer about returning to the Land of Israel. It’s the antidote to a piece I posted two weeks ago called “To Find Home,” a difficult prayer/poem about struggling to find a sense of home. To listen along, click on the triangle in the bar below. The text follows.

The Way Home
G-d of Old
The One who led our ancestors to a land of promise,
A vision of abundance,
Milk and honey from holy soil,
Grant me the strength to follow that sacred path,
Trials in the desert,
Trials of heart,
The journey home.

Ancient One,
Your Voice resounds in the hills,
Your Call echoes in the valleys,
Your Mysteries waiting
In the desert and by the seas.

Home is in my breath,
In my eyes,
In my heart.
Home is in the joy and the laughter,
In the work and the struggle,
In the toil and in the rest.

Blessed are You, G-d of our Ancestors,
You are the way home.

Postscript: Please take a moment to read “To Find Home” and compare it to this prayer. Which one resonates more for you? Which one are you more likely to use in your own prayer? Here are links to the other prayers I’ve written here in Israel: “Sages” and “A Song that Holds My Heart.”

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To Find Home

Posted on: June 17th, 2011 by tobendlight

Day five in Israel. After two days in Tel Aviv, I’m now in Haifa. On a solitary up-hill walk, it became clear that I’m here looking for something, but have no idea what it is. I don’t even have the words yet to ask the question, let alone find an answer. Then, suddenly, it struck me that I’ve lost the definition of the word ‘home.’

Addendum 12.16.2011: A week after I wrote this, still in Israel, the antidote to the yearning of this prayer came in the form of another piece called: “The Way Home.” I’ve been back in the US for six months and will return to Israel in less than three weeks.

To Find Home
Ancient One,
Without mast or sail,
Compass or sextant,
Tiller or anchor,
Stripped of pretense,
Raw and naked,
I look to You
To guide my way.

What shall I call home?
A land, a topography, a geography?
A place? A people?
History and memory?
A dwelling, a building, a house?
Safety, security, comfort?
A space inside of me?

G-d of Old,
The One who sent our ancestors on their journeys,
Lead me on a steady path,
A path of wholeness and love.
The path to my name.
The path to my home.

If the struggle is long, Amen.
If the struggle is swift, Amen.
When the path is rough, Amen.
When the path is smooth, Amen.
If the way is darkness, Amen.
If the way is light, Amen.
When I am lost, Amen.
When I return, Amen.

Postscript: One definition of home is clear: wherever I leave a piece of my heart. So there will always be a piece of home with my daughters, with my sisters, with my Mom. Perhaps that’s why my heart aches when someone leaves or dies. This is the second prayer that I’ve begun on this trip and the first that has reached a reasonable draft. Related prayers include: “Being Lost” and “For the Lost.”

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Dwelling Place

Posted on: September 24th, 2010 by tobendlight

A prayer/poem about the meaning of home, posted for Sukkot.

To listen while you read, click on the triangle in the bar below. The entire text follows.

Dwelling Place
This is my dwelling-place.
The place of my bounty and sustenance,
Study and reflection.

This is my living-place.
The place of my comfort and rest,
Quiet and peace.

This is my working-place.
The place of my dedication and strength,
Pride and honor.

This is my loving-place.
The place of my family and heart,
Warmth and shelter.

This is my memory-place.
The place of my seasons and sensations,
Traditions and transitions.

This is my hoping-place.
The place of my dreams and desires,
Visions and wonder.

This is my mourning-place.
The place of endings and beginnings,
Grief and renewal.

This is my dying-place.
The place of my release and surrender,
Letting go and passing on.

This is my dwelling-place.
The place of my moments and years,
Blessings and gifts,
Sabbaths of the heart,
Sabbaths of the soul.

Postscript: Other songs and prayers of the Spiritual Traveler include: “Come Walk,” “Bird is Bird,” “River,” “Soarbird” and “I am Breathing.” Click here for the entire list of songs of the Spiritual Traveler.

Please consider making a contribution to support this site and my writing. For usage guidelines and reprint permissions, see “Share the Prayer!” For notices of new prayers, please subscribe. You can also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Posts Tagged ‘home’

One-by-One: A Prayer as the COVID Death Toll Mounts

The Blessing of Faces: A Zoom Prayer

Sheltering in Place

For Creating a Home

Oh You Hills, Oh You Sands

The Way Home

To Find Home

Dwelling Place

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