The First Stroke: When a Prayer Becomes a Poem

There are prayers we pray with trembling clarity. words we choose carefully and offer with hope.

And then there are the prayers we forget we ever spoke.

This post is born from one of those forgotten prayers, a quiet, unremembered murmur in a small chapel. I don’t recall the exact words. I only remember the stained glass, the ache of something unnamed, and the weight of an empty journal resting in my lap like a dare.

I had come to listen. I didn’t expect to be heard. But I was.

And the response didn’t come in thunder or Scripture.

It came through my hand.

A pen.

A poem.

A flood.

What Poured Out Was Not Just Mine

“The pen hit the paper, and these words are what flowed…”

I began to write without knowing why. I didn’t plan to share. I didn’t know what was buried inside me, or how long I’d been holding my breath.

The first words felt unfamiliar, yet so deeply mine. The lines that followed carried my history, my humor, and my healing. And yet, I knew this: they weren’t just for me.

There were no titles. No categories. No instructions. Just a quiet invitation: Let the words find their meaning in you.

Every poem in A Blank Canvas is offered as a gift of vulnerability and trust.

A whisper of healing.

A glimpse of grace.

A breath, waiting to be shared.

Reflection: What I Still Carry

I don’t remember the exact conversations that took place in that chapel. I don’t know every face. But I remember the feeling, like the Spirit was breathing in and out of my journal, and through every moment of my silence, God had been listening.

“From a forgotten request and what I'd heard in some rumor... ‘Ask and you shall receive,’ He did grant.”

I didn’t expect poems. I didn’t expect a beginning. But God gave me both.

Pause & Reflect: Your Blank Canvas

Close your eyes. Breathe gently. Let this question settle in your heart:

What is your blank canvas longing to portray?

What title would your soul give the next chapter of your story?

Consider:

• What desire, buried or forgotten, still stirs in you?

• What have you held back, believing it had no audience or worth?

• What if that whisper is precisely where God wants to begin?

Take a moment. Pick up a pen. Even one word is enough.

Embodied Prayer: The Breath of Beginning

Posture: Sit with your journal or hands resting gently on your lap.

Breath Prayer:

Inhale: “Create in me…”

Exhale: “…a space to begin again.”

Let the breath move through your body like a brush stroke. No pressure. Just presence.

Scripture Echo

“We are the clay, and You are the potter; we are all the work of Your hand.” - Isaiah 64:8

Even when we forget what we prayed for, God remembers.

Even when we feel blank, His hand never stops creating.

Your canvas is not empty. It is waiting.

Begin.

One breath. One word. One stroke at a time.

With you,

Kimi