Davenning at Forty-Nine

Last Shabbat, as I was davenning, the following poem began to form in my mind. It's a kind of meditation on praying as I get older.

Davenning at Forty-Nine

I found it very hard to bow

in synagogue when I was young

as all my ancestors had done

I felt too proud to submit so

but after half a century

my knees and back bend well subdued

yet one more proof that life intrudes

upon our prayers like gravity

which is perhaps a kind of grace

or yet another name for God

inexorable earthbound nod

to which we bow surrender praise