God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference
between the moments when he throws me into the stands on purpose
and when he does not
Lord, grant the understanding and strength
to feel his fingers clutching me like a greasy cantaloupe
and the sympathy of knowing that I do not know my destination
but neither does he,
and that is unsettling for us both
Grant me the peace that passeth understanding
For the instant I am wound in twirling circles
from hip, to shoulder, and to hip and back again,
and wandering round the back and shoulders for a trice,
and to forgive whomever did trespass upon this throwing motion
and make it as wandering as Moses in the desert
and as long as that sacred journey.
May you grant me the grace to accept what may come
Whether I tumble end over end, or wobble like a broken drillbit
Or hammer 'gainst the chest pads like an errant mortar
thrown from the mouth of a cracked, forgotten fountain of destruction.
Help me in that moment I am double-clutched.
Hear my cry as I am spun into perverse and accidental geometries
Of which no man can claim understanding.
Make my interceptions soft, and brief as a summer rain
And let my fumbles land on the softest, untrod earth.
Protect me from yon yard markers, which hurt like the pox when struck at high speed,
May the umpires stroke me with the cleanest of towels.
May the fans who catch me be clean, even if they are from Philadelphia.
Let my transfers be neat, from hand to hand
Let the holy trinity of points of contact guide me safely.
Let my suffering be for a greater purpose
Tim Tebow, PGA Tour member.
Remember in me a hope
That in rare flight from his hand I may achieve perfection
An unwavering parabola from point to point
Traveling in the ether bidden to land
In waiting hands, be they intentional or unintentional
And that He should see this sight, and be glad,
For this is hard for both of us, and those in witness to it.
Let him understand a completion is a completion.
Lord, grant me that grace of the skies
That in flight from a fumble, or flying e'er higher into row 34
Or rising like hope from the toe of a punter
That I may look down on him, and your creation
To behold its beauty, and his, and indeed the world's
And know that with each kick and palsied pass
I get closer to fourth down, and a boot skyward
And for an instant that much closer to thee.