Getting Through

GETTING THROUGH

In a decade eggnog-thick with conspiracy theories, 

here’s another one: My prayers are being intercepted. 

No? Examine the facts. Cancer still inhabits the bodies

of good people. Deacons bicker over how to congregate

in love. My niece (I know it was a niece) was never 

born. It’s not, as far as I can tell, an inability on His 

part to answer them—instead, I doubt they’re ever

getting there at all, caught in transit like a Christmas 

gift arriving on the 27th. But who, you rightly ask, 

would snatch a prayer before it reaches Him, would

pluck it from the air like a street magician snags

a quarter from your ear? I’d tell you if I could, 

of course, but my suspicion is the squirrel taking 

residence above my bed, curled up around a mound

of Help us, Lord’s and Tell me why’s, enough to see 

him safely through the Winter months. Joke’s on him:

he of everyone should know that no filtration 

system is fine enough to keep a persistent one

from slinking through the vents—hell, I've even

heard a corpse once slipped a fissure in its tomb.