How did we get here?
(silence)
My Lady,
My mother
My hope
My city
My creator
My sorrows
My grief
My faith used to work well,
it used to cover the problems.
It gave me answers
It gave me certainty
It told me truth
I knew how things worked
but it doesn’t work anymore.
The rug has been pulled and I have fallen down.
My stomach lurched.
The uncanny movement in the corner of my eye
That turns to doubt
That false step in the dark.
When the answer didn’t answer
and my Lady
There are no answers anymore.
(silence)
It’s Saturday
I am on the road to Emmaus and there’s a stranger behind me –
They are demanding I explain my pain, over and over and over and over
I don’t want to
It’s my pain, they couldn’t understand
They don’t know what’s happened these past days
How did we get here?
(silence)
My Lady
There are no answers anymore
Meaningless Meaningless, everything is meaningless
Stories of dislocation,
Stories of desolation,
Stories of disassociation.
The universe is unimaginably cold, dark, and empty.
Life is rare and marginal in its vast array.
And what life there is, is in pain
Life is pain.
Life is born through pain,
Life must inflict pain; to live
and then life dies in pain
there are no more answers my Lady
Life is rare and marginal
And within this marginal life is a creature cursed with reason, conscience, awareness and reality
It knows it’s in pain
And the pain is acute my Lady
Because happiness exists
But happiness is fleeting
and because happiness is brief,
we are either looking back in longing or looking forward in fear,
afraid of losing it.
And so we find new and imaginative ways to give pain to each other and so ourselves.
How did we get here?
(silence)
My Lady
How deserted the city looks
How deserted the city looks on the News and on Facebook.
Empty shells, empty buildings, empty bodies that have become a slave to empty violence.
Mothers’ tears soak the ground, her children are all gone
Images of pain
Images of death
How did we get here
Pictures of people sinking to the depths.
Front pages of little boys washed up
Scandals of old men
The abuse of power
The rich get richer
The poor gets poorer and everyone is afraid
How did we get here
There are loud voices that shout about the ones who threaten and they threaten the loud voices that shout
It’s their fault, My Lady
It’s their fault
They took our jobs
Our land
Our freedom
Our happiness
And God’s on our side
Allah is with us
How did we get here
The small voices clamour,
I’m hungry,
I’m cold,
I’m lonely,
I’m scared,
I’m bored,
I don’t want to do this
I’m not feeling into this
I need somewhere to live
I need someone to love
How did we get here
I’m sorry my Lady
This is so depressing – I want to look away.
Just for a while.
The people ask
Where are you God?
But there are no more answers
And this is so depressing
I want to close my eyes
Look Lord on this affliction,
the enemy has overcome.
And there are no more answers
How did we get here
And where are you God?
God has rejected us and fear is running rampant in the streets.
Fear is on the air and in the in the ink and shines through in the artificial light we create to cover our darkness.
How did we get here?
I’m sorry my Lady
This is so depressing
And where are you God
I’ll just close my eyes for a while
(silence)
Oh God
I look up
You called us to leave our fathers’ homes
To follow you into the desert
to forsake our household gods,
to leave the comfort of what we knew.
You invited us to a new tomorrow
but it’s still Saturday.
The enemy has triumphed
and I am still on that road to Emmaus.
With that stranger explaining my pain again and again and again and again
Where are you God
There are no more answers
How did we get here?
I look down
I sit with Job scraping my sores.
I didn’t deserve this, why has this happened.
I cry out to You, but You do not answer me;
I stand up, and You regard me.
But You have become cruel to me;
I look around and see Jeremiah who wishes he had never been born,
Cursed be the day I was born
I didn’t ask for this life, it’s too hard.
I stand with Habakuk and ask you,
why do you make us look at injustice?
Why do you tolerate wrongdoing?
The wicked hem in the righteous and so justice is perverted.
I step forward.
Where are you God? Why do you forsake me!
Let this cup pass to another
I feel their eyes turned towards me forming the question forming on their lips.
“What is your God like, what God do you follow?”
(silence)
I falter,
my God desires mercy not violence.
They look at me
“Why do you make us look at injustice?
"Why do you tolerate wrongdoing?"
"Do you not know what has happened these past days?”
But,
But I am dependent on forces beyond my control
It’s not my fault
And this is so depressing
I’m sorry
I want to look away to turn my face and pass by
Just close my eyes
It’s odious and unacceptable…
Am I odious and unacceptable?
Can my odious thoughts be transformed into something new?
This is so depressing
I want to look away
But,
But I can no longer be simply the objective observer.
There are no answers
And this world is in pain and there is no chloroform.
This world is in pain and there is an abundance of morphine.
I want to bury my face in the numbing comfort
I can’t look away
I want to return to my household gods and all that I knew
but I can’t look away
I force myself to look and see.
My Lady
And I weep.
My eyes fail from weeping
How did we get here?
How did we get here?
I can’t believe that this is happening.
What can I say for you?
What can I liken you to that I may comfort you?
Your wounds are as deep as the sea.
Who can heal you?
I will sit with you in shiva, my Lady
I will look and see your pain.
I will own that I am in pain with you, that we are together.
I know your sufferings do not compare to mine.
I know my sufferings do not compare to yours.
I am in torment within
I will let my tears flow like a river,
We have no relief
We have no rest
Look Lord on this affliction – the enemy has overcome us.
God, you have rejected us.
Have you swallowed us in your cloud of anger.
Young and old are lying on the ground
Young men and young women have fallen to violence
Do you want us to confess? To sacrifice?
What do you want?
How do we make this better or are you just too angry?
Some say we learn through trauma.
Others say we learn about God through trauma.
You desire mercy and not violence.
Is this madness or revelation?
I can’t turn away – I should, my reason tells me to
but under you, any genius is rebuked.
I’m not afraid of you, no, yet I am afraid.
How did we get here?
To speak of mercy, peace and diplomacy is considered dangerous
We are told to keep throwing bombs from afar at the people we armed
And this is wise and just action.
We believed them when they told us it was the others fault
We followed false idols of desire
Our prophets lead us astray
Our oracles are false and misleading
The truth is not shared
Wake up
Look
See
My Lady
Let us lift our voices to the Lord
Let's cry aloud
Let's arise cry out in the night
Let'
s pour out our hearts
Look oh Lord and consider!
I am on the road to Emmaus, desperate for the stranger to understand my pain,
Exposing our wounds, again and again
It is Saturday
How did we get here
Dawn Cole-Savidge