Our Prayer of Thanks

By Carl Sandburg

For the gladness here where the sun is shining at
         evening on the weeds at the river,
    Our prayer of thanks.

For the laughter of children who tumble barefooted and
         bareheaded in the summer grass,
    Our prayer of thanks.

For the sunset and the stars, the women and the white
         arms that hold us,
    Our prayer of thanks.

    God,
If you are deaf and blind, if this is all lost to you,
God, if the dead in their coffins amid the silver handles
         on the edge of town, or the reckless dead of war
         days thrown unknown in pits, if these dead are
         forever deaf and blind and lost,
    Our prayer of thanks.

    God,
The game is all your way, the secrets and the signals and
         the system; and so for the break of the game and
         the first play and the last.
    Our prayer of thanks.

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