An Atheist’s Prayer

Dear Nothing,
take me softly.
I’ll go quietly.

Just wait until Scheherazade
finishes her stories.
Just wait until the Golden Gate
is painted.
Just wait until I reach the end
of the M25.
Failing all that, just wait until
all the Stones
are dead.

And when you take me
please redistribute me
one molecule at a time
in the following places:

Distribute me into
the glistening black
bow tie
of a James Bond
not yet born.
Let me be a hero.

Distribute me into
the snow white fur
of the cat
on the lap
of the villain
across from Bond.
Let me see both sides of the argument.

Distribute me into
the dense weave
of a perfectly imperfect
Persian rug.
Let me brighten up the joint.

Distribute me into
the celluloid
of an archival print
of The Third Man.
Let me always
feel the flicker,
hear the zither.

Distribute me into
an astronaut’s lunch
so I can be ejected
to drift in sleepy deep freeze
for sixty million years
and one day seed a distant moon.
Let me see the world.

Distribute me into
the horse hair of a violin bow
the catgut of a guitar string
the stretched skin
of a rock and roll snare.
Let me always bring the noise.

One piece of me needs special care.

Oh Nothing, your chaotic art
must pack one piece of me
alongside the molecules of
my coy mistress
within the same sweet
humming summer bumblebee
so we may buzz together
and taste the nectar of
back gardens.

Whatever’s left I’d like you
to carefully place
into the
cigarette-smoking lips
of French girls.

Sweet Nothing,
wash me in the wind
and in the water.
Lose me in the sands of time
for when I’m lost
in all these places
in all these outer and
these inner spaces,
perhaps I shall be useful.
Perhaps I shall be found.