O Lord, I have barred my door, 

I have bolted my gates and locked my windows, 

To turn back the burglar and the marauder, 

To thwart the thief in the night  

Who comes to steal and to destroy, 

And demolish what he cannot carry off. 

My strength he takes, my understanding he dismantles; 

He joins my might to his, while I grow dull and weary. 

Maker of all things, I unfasten my portals, 

Fling wide my gates, and raise my windows to the sun;  

Though thieves break in and steal, 

And though despoilers pilfer in the dark; 

Though they take away powers of mind and body; 

Sparing neither strength of youth, nor wisdom of years, 

I invite them now, nor beg them spare 

Anything of all you have entrusted to me. 

One thing I ask of the Eternal: though might departs, 

And strength be overturned, 

Though thought be cut off,  

And understanding blighted, 

Let me keep love, O Giver of my strength; 

Let love uplift me like the buoying wind; 

The love of family warm me like the sun, 

The love of friends refresh me like the rain; 

The love of those who teach, and those who learn, 

Of counselors and counseled, all the love; 

And let my love break forth, as from a dam, 

And all be cleansed in scouring, soothing love. 

(Note: this poem was inspired by a passage from James Thurber’s 1933 short story, “The Night  the Bed Fell.” The narrator describes an aunt “who never went to bed at night without the fear  that a burglar was going to get in and blow chloroform under her door through a tube. To avert  this calamity—for she was in greater dread of anesthetics than of losing her household goods— she always piled her money, silverware, and other valuables in a neat stack just outside her  bedroom, with a note reading: ‘This is all I have. Please take it and do not use your chloroform,  as this is all I have.’”)