A Prayer

A Prayer

P K Routray

Please bless me with pains and pangs to suffer,
But give me strength and courage to bear them with pleasure.
Please rob me of my wealth and make me needy and poor,
But when I fight to make my both ends meet my love for divine duties should not disappear.
I do not pray you to fulfill my need,
But I do pray you to kill my greed.
Let me remain illiterate, ignorant and lacking in modern culture,
So that without semblance of shame I can live in the forest with nature.
Take away all the laurels and praises showered on me on this earth,
But compel me to practice austerity so that my ego and vanity will meet their death.
I do not pray my love and affection get reciprocated,
But I pray to show me the ways so that my longings for attachment are annihilated.
I do not pray for fulfillment of any kind of my desire,
But I do pray for your wrath to fall on me when they do appear.
To strive for my survival I do not pray for your mercy,
But I do pray your divine grace to end my sense of jealousy
I do not pray you to cause the end of my lust and anger,
Please do divert them for the benefit of your creation and creature.
Let the bane of physical, metaphysical and fatal calamities overwhelm me any time,
But please give me your benign blessings to face them with fortitude and enjoy their chime.
Do not take me out of the life’s adversities,
But teach me how to face them and foresee their underlying beauties.
Please do not rush to help me when I cry and shed tear,
But allow me time to learn to remember you,, offer and surrender.