Supplication

Turkish prayer rug, 18th c., National Museum in Warsaw

“O Shaper of varicolored clay and cellulose, O Keeper / of same”
Scott Cairns, “Idiot Psalms”

This is a help ticket, a message in a bottle, a parchment
scroll jammed into the Kotel by literally hired hands. O
Shaper, O Keeper, it begins, but it never does end with
anything other than an ellipsis. How could it, when our
need for assistance is infinite, unbounded? O Shaper, it
asks, strengthen the armature upon which you add what
will be reduced. O Keeper, it asks, unlock the storm cellar
and let us hide among booklets of gold leaf, jam jars full
of pigment, preserve us from the whirlwind. Protect us
that we might weave ourselves into every magic carpet,
encoding in warp and weft an invisible breath, a flight…