Matins

Dearest Lord, in deepest night

Our eyes are blinded

By the black veil drawn tight

Across our weakened eyes.

Now in this dark,

We remember how

You spoke into a darkness, the darkness

Of which a breathing world was created.

It obeyed your slightest will:

Thrashing rivers of chaos

Controlled by the slightest touch of your hand.

In this way you soothed

The pyroclastic fires beneath the earth

trembling pressures were relieved, making

Granite and obsidian, quartz and basalt.

The earth became still and knew your love.

The primordial wind which

Wandered its whipping way.

It you harnessed, collared, and hushed.

The wanderings of the storm-giants

You corralled by your command.

Rivers too massive to cross

With their abyss too deep to touch,

You Pruned and thinned with your love

Until the most useful,

The most balanced remained.

And the earth itself you sculpted:

Hill and mountains uplifted

By your squeezing hands

Gorge, and canyon were depressed

By water running through your fingers.

And to life you said:

“Be fruitful and multiply”

All your works O Lord were created

Out of darkness,

A darkness that existed before the light,

The darkness that expects it and

Does not strive against it—

Out of a darkness

That rejoices to be changed

You created all things.

Your dark material

You fused proton by proton

To create something:

Elements and molecules—

To form this complex colossus

That is Earth.

You created it all… all of this

Out of darkness, out of nothing.

And so we do not fear

It, but stand in its midst

Rejoicing with it,

Singing with it

In our own way.