MEMORY

Holy Spirit, God of Wisdom, God of Time,
God of my mind, please protect the book
of my memory. Please let it not be sealed away from me.

As age advances, memories drift imperceptibly into bosky woods, where leaves of knowledge and information fall lazily, and foggy dusk comes on.

Gauzy scrims of forgetfulness descend, silently as footfalls on moss.
Details intermix and blur, faces fade
into one another, place-names interchange,
and connections fray and dissolve.

Certainty and confidence are causalities.
Fear lurks on the spongy edges
of the abyss of doubt.

The specter of dread Dr. Alzheimer appears
through the cloudy mists of clutching fear.

Help me, Holy Spirit, to face the alterations of advancing age with grace and acceptance.

But if it be at all possible, Oh, God,
please, please, I beg You, make me forgetful,
but let the chalice of complete memory loss
be taken away from me.

May I, dear God, not become a burden
to others. Remove the details, but please,
I pray with all my mind and heart, let me hold on to the essentials. Let me remain capable of managing my life and giving support to others, rather than becoming helpless: a responsibility rather than
a companion.

All this I pray, dear God, Holy Spirit,
with all my heart and all my mind, in humble acceptance and enduring reverence and love.

Amen

 

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