Prayer

This poem was written by Connie TerMaat and published in the Fall 1950 Calvin College Literary Review. It was one of the six poems that won him the top prize in the Eerdmans Literary Awards competition.

Prayer

God, we who travel in the night upon the lake
Have loved the vastness of our world.
We have seen Thy hand
And even in the stars, Thy face.
We thank Thee in the times of storm
For harbor lights, the red and white
That guide us from the violent dark;
We of little faith who dare not tread
The waves which bare the heavy moon,
The golden footsteps of the sun,
We who have entered harbors during a storm
To find the tumult of great emptiness,
We who must so soon depart the lake,
We ask for lights to leads us home,
To guide us to that port where seagulls cry
And circling, sing not loneliness, but love.