A Prayer For the Senses During the Mercy Season

With credit to Arthur Burk and Carlene Prince:
Spirit of G-d,
Please don’t let another day pass without me being able to recognize, anticipate, celebrate, savor, and tell about Your fingerprints in all of creation.
Transform my senses in the way You want them transformed that they may be utilized to experience the reality of Your creation inthe way You want me to experience it.
Utilize them, Ruach HaKodesh, to be additional tools in my toolkit that my spirit can utilize to discern the work of Your hands of kindness.
Anoint my eyes with eye salve to see what You put before them, to recognize the kaleidoscopic beauty of the snows that fall, the humidity the flowers need, the cacti in the arid desert, the mosses and lichens of the taiga, the raging waves of the oceans, and the colors of the rainbow that follow a maelstromic thunderstorm.
Anoint my ears to hear the blessed sound of every raven, crow, vulture, and buzzard I have ever cursed, and to bless them with precisely the song that Father wants them to sing, that they may experience the redemption You have designed for them. Help me to speak with the authority You have given me to see them redeemed from the culture of covens that seek to use them for foul purposes, given they are Your blessed servants and their loyalty and bonds of community and expressions of affection within their breeds are rivalled in few other places in the Animal Kingdom. Help me to see them as the picture of loyalty and the workers of cleansing, cleanup, and sanitation that You put in every place. Help me to see and hear their beauty, in stark defiance of the many ways they have been badly used and abused by the kingdom of darkness.
Help me to rightly hear the sound of every bird, the silence of every snowfall, the sharpness of every cutting breeze, and even the sound of every light.
Help me to appreciate the sound of crying babies and the bustle of cars in Battery Park City.
Teach me how not to curse the traffic I have to deal with, but to appreciate every moment You have designed for me as a moment to redeem with hearing the way You hear, even if it is the sound of a hundred cars going the same place I am going. Help me to never waste a moment in that traffic.
Help me to treasure and see redeemed the sounds I once cursed.
And to hear anew the sounds I often take for granted. Help me to remember that some sounds will only occur for a season, while other sounds are eternal.
Anoint my nose and mouth to smell the fragrances and aromas around me and to taste the flavors in the way You have designed me to respond. Help me to rightly discern the scent and flavor of those things I enjoy, as well as scents with which I may not be as familiar,
The rose and the Confederate Jasmine; the pungent garlic and onion; the depth of Rosemary and Thyme; the grinding and brewing coffee early in the morning with breakfast and late at night with pie; the scent of fresh rain on a hot summery day; bacon or lamb frying and chicken roasting; the sweet smell of leaves decomposing on the forest floor; the sharp and refreshing scent of Frasier Fir and Scotch Pine; the smell of baby powder and warmed milk; gas fumes; cut grass; antifreeze; fried cod and malt vinegar; and a million other things I may or may not recognize. Help my nose and month to be points of contact that are used to discern, celebrate, and expand Your kingdom.
And, Ruach HaKodesh, anoint my hands, feet, and skin to contact everything You want me to touch, and to celebrate those things that I enjoy.
Help me to recognize and not just be Your hands and feet to touch the lives of others, but also to receive the touch that is so critical to the flourishing of life. As You have designed joy to be the emotion that is expressed in the context of community, help us to engage with our sense of touch in such a way so as to discover those things that bring us joy and the aspects of touch that You utilize in us to bring others intense joy. You have not merely dwell alone in isolation, nor have You designed us to either give or receive, but to do both giving and receiving by turns, and to engage with others in community, whatever that looks like.
In the name of Yeshua Ha-Mashiach.
Amen