Commerce
by Ward Kelley

Prayers once were ships floating upon
seas that comprise the minds of gods,

rippling the thoughts of these, our masters,
or sometimes smoothing their more

spiteful inclinations like a carpenter
might plane a prickly board. Prayers,

I once believed, were demanded by
the gods as though they required

vessels to float serenely on their oceans,
but I now understand a prayer is the last

thing the gods want because these waters
are clogged by a million years worth of

exhortation, and the gods are hiding far,
far below in the depths of their own souls,

thinking how these ships make the builders
feel much better, but do little for commerce.

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