Apophatic Prayer
by Karl Plank
Karl Plank is the J. W. Cannon Professor of Religion at Davidson College (NC). His poetry has appeared in journals including Beloit Poetry Journal, New Madrid, Spiritus, The Anglican Theological Review and Poetry Daily. His teaching and research concern biblical and poetic intertextuality, contemplation and ethics, and modern Jewish literature and thought. kaplank@davidson.edu
How shall I call You
Who are Not?
Shall I sing the rest
Between notes
Or the sound of
Sounds ceasing to be?
You are not the breast
My lips kiss
Yet like sweet milk
You taste in my mouth.
You are not the broken bread
But on You I feed.
Not the storm, not the fire
yet desire.
Even wafer-thin silence
—metaphor.
But there let me rest
With You who are
And are Not
My God, My Not-Not.
Karl Plank is the J. W. Cannon Professor of Religion at Davidson College (NC). His poetry has appeared in journals including Beloit Poetry Journal, New Madrid, Spiritus, The Anglican Theological Review and Poetry Daily. His teaching and research concern biblical and poetic intertextuality, contemplation and ethics, and modern Jewish literature and thought. kaplank@davidson.edu
How shall I call You
Who are Not?
Shall I sing the rest
Between notes
Or the sound of
Sounds ceasing to be?
You are not the breast
My lips kiss
Yet like sweet milk
You taste in my mouth.
You are not the broken bread
But on You I feed.
Not the storm, not the fire
yet desire.
Even wafer-thin silence
—metaphor.
But there let me rest
With You who are
And are Not
My God, My Not-Not.
