Lord of Laughter

(excerpted from “I Am in Need of . . . of What” by Ted Loder, in Guerillas of Grace)

Lord of laughter, as of tears,
shake me awake
and teach me to laugh at myself,
at my black-draped solemnity,
over my petty preoccupation with success and failure,
through all the hurt and adversity

until my laughter lures me deep
beneath the terror without names,
beneath the questions without answers,
beneath the pain without relief;

lures me deep
to the love in me unused,
to the strength unspent,
to the courage untapped,
to the dream unrisked
to the beauty unexpressed;

all the way down
to the inescapable bottom,
to the awareness that I must get on
with being who I am
as fully as I can,
as unflinchingly as I can,
as accurately as I can,

which is to say
as gracefully,
as powerfully,
as faithfully
as you have created me to be.