deepest prayer

A person should always offer a prayer of graciousness 

for the love that has awakened in them. 

When you feel love for your beloved and his or her love for you, 

now and again you should offer the warmth of your love 

as a blessing for those who are damaged and unloved. 

Send that love out into the world to people who are desperate; 

to those who are starving; to those who are trapped in prison; 

in hospitals and all the brutal terrains of bleak and tormented lives. 

When you send that love out from the bountifulness of your own love, 

it reaches other people. 

This love is the deepest power of prayer.

~ John O'Donohue

from Anam Cara