On Speaking to God Honestly and Expectantly

Crude Communication

Decades of prayers

Have risen to endless blue

Like ill-formed smoke signals

From this fire of me

They have not

Cooled and unclamped my fists,

Have not spent my soul 

To tranquil piety

Rather,

I breathe out acrid, clinging words,

Tasting blood and bile

Wondering fitfully

How beauty will be woven this time