Prayer for Children
We pray for children
Who put chocolate fingers everywhere
Who like to be tickled
Who stamp in puddles and ruin their new pants
Who sneak popsicles before supper
Who erase holes in math workbooks
Who can never find their shoes.
And we pray for those
Who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire
Who can't bounce down the street in a pair of new sneakers
Who never "counted potatoes"
Who are born in places we wouldn't be caught dead
Who never go to the circus
Who live in an X-rated world.
We pray for children
Who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions
Who sleep with the dog and bury goldfish
Who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money
Who cover themselves with Band-Aids and sing off-key
Who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink
Who slurp their soup.
And we pray for those
Who never get dessert
Who have no safe blanket to drag behind them
Who watch their parents watch them die
Who can't find any bread to steal
Who don't have rooms to clean up
Whose pictures aren't on anybody's dresser
Whose monsters are real.
We pray for children
Who spend all their allowance before Tuesday
Who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their food
Who like ghost stories
Who shove dirty clothes under the bed and never rinse out the tub
Who get visits from the tooth fairy
Who don't like to be kissed in front of the carpool
Who squirm in church and scream in the phone
Whose tears we sometimes laugh at
And whose smiles can make us cry.
And we pray for those
Whose nightmares come in the daytime
Who will eat anything
Who have never seen a dentist
Who aren't spoiled by anybody
Who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep
Who live and move but have no being.
We pray for the children
Who want to be carried
And for those that must be.
For those we never give up on
And for those who don't have a second chance
For those we smother
...and those who will grab the hand of anyone
Kind enough to offer it.

--Ina Hughs, Charlotte N.C. Observer, 10/3/1995