Breaking bread

The Rev. Gayanne Frater

7 February 2014

Breaking bread

 

Here and now I hold my bread
Alone at table,
I gazed with delight at                     
freshly baked bread.
I savoured its colour,
texture,
fragrance
and breathed in deep.
Simple joy bubbled up from my belly,
a smile broke out on my face,
as I took bread,
felt its warmth in my hands.
Every pore in my body
zinging with pleasure.
I felt alive.
In this moment of time,     
I remembered words from
morning prayer,  
'here and now I hold my bread'.  
 
An unspoken question
gently threaded its way
to the surface of my mind,
“Will I ever break bread again?”
Bathed in gentle grief,  
This priest without a parish,
remembered breaking bread
at Eucharist.
A past action  
so it seemed.
As I held myself in that moment,
the Living Word
tumbled into the holy silence.
You break bread
every time you hear someone into speech.
 
Every time you speak from your true heart
words of life and hope to others,
you break bread.
Every time your unfettered laughter
ripples across a room,  
you break bread.
Every time you sing our song of Love
in the company of others,
you break bread.
Woman of mine, you break bread,
as you give life, my life, to others
when fully alive.
Yes, you will 'break bread' again.
You never stopped.
 
Here and now I hold my bread.  
 
     
©Gayanne Frater
January 2014