"…He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart…" Isaiah 40:11 NIV

Heart, circumcised

the gentile wraps herself

cozily in a wide tallit

fingers the knotted tzit' tzit

one by one

and remembers the ordinances

Encircled in embroidered white

wool striped blue

like the Israeli flag

that waves over the land

of her Machiach, Yeshua

she flashes back

to a Holy Land pilgrimage—

a Messianic wedding ceremony

in an olive grove at Cana

a four-cornered tallit

their makeshift canopy

and covering of protection

She knows

He is pleased to cover her

like a hen covers her chicks

beneath feathered wings

Ever since The Record

published the feature:

"Praying Under a Prayer Shawl

is Like Getting a Hug…From God"

she's been

enthralled by

the sheep-gathering God

Who beckons lambs

to His bosom

and children to His knee

She’s not alone—

He is her Bridegroom

She nestles beneath His covering

as she reads and studies

…and prays

secure in the embrace

of the husbandly God

Who loves her

Maude Carolan Pych is a former newspaper reporter who now writes Christian inspirational poetry and poems to record family history. She leads the Paper, Pen & Praise ministry at her congregation and publishes It's All About...THE LAMB quarterly on her blog. Her newest chapbooks are A Pilgrim's Quest--A Poet Visits the Holy Land, From My Heart to Yours at Christmas--Cookies & Poems, and The Widow's Song. A mom and grandmom, she resides in the Garden State with her husband, Robert and worships at Beth Israel Messianic Center, Wayne, where she serve as a deaconess.