Establish a House, Even a House of Prayer

 “If there’s some other way to gain experience,
Then grant that I may find that way.”
This was my constant prayer.  Unlike my peers
Who wanted to grow up, I would have stayed
A child in that vast Dome of Innocence
Where God preserves the Purest of the Pure.
He answered my request, “I send thee hence
My child to build thy home and to secure
Thy crown.”  The Father’s plan was this: I’d work
To build a home where He was known, where faith
And works made sure foundation stones, where words
Were more than sounds on air.  They were the lathe
And plaster holding up the walls.  To bear
Up Truth, experience became the stairs.

Each step in agency was laid–most whole,
Some half, most up, some down, but none a platform
Made.  I found that windows were the goals
I’d framed.  Most held God’s light; a few had slats
That darkened them, but in the nursery drapes
Were folds of fun. The outside walls were
Variously done.  Steel frames and fire escapes
Ascending up witnessed my constant prayer
For strength to be prepared.  Rock walls held out
The elements.  Weak joists fell prey to bores
And mouse’s holes and yet there rose about
That home the dome I long had labored for.
And though my home’s no castle in the air,
The Purest of the Pure are sheltered there.