Sometimes I wish I knew what to say… November 28, 2007
Posted by Anya in : Uncategorized , trackbackWhat do you say when you find out that a friend’s mom is dying? When the friend is a year younger than you and has five younger siblings?
So I say that I don’t know what to say, which is true, and remind him of John 16.
And pray.
And get Jars of Clay’s song Oh My God stuck in my head.
Oh my God, look around this place
Your fingers reach around the bone
You set the break and set the tone
Flights of grace, and future falls
In present pain
All fools say, “Oh my God”
Oh my God, Why are we so afraid?
We make it worse when we don’t bleed
There is no cure for our disease
Turn a phrase, and rise again
Or fake your death and only tell your closest friend
Oh my God.
Oh my God, can I complain?
You take away my firm belief and graft my soul upon your grief
Weddings, boats and alibis
All drift away, and a mother cries
Liars and fools; sons and failures
Thieves will always say
Lost and found; ailing wanderers
Healers always say
Whores and angels; men with problems
Leavers always say
Broken hearted; separated
Orphans always say
War creators; racial haters
Preachers always say
Distant fathers; fallen warriors
Givers always say
Pilgrim saints; lonely widows
Users always say
Fearful mothers; watchful doubters
Saviors always say
Sometimes I cannot forgive
And these days, mercy cuts so deep
If the world was how it should be, maybe I could get some sleep
While I lay, I dream we’re better,
Scales were gone and faces light
When we wake, we hate our brother
We still move to hurt each other
Sometimes I can close my eyes,
And all the fear that keeps me silent falls below my heavy breathing,
What makes me so badly bent?
We all have a chance to murder
We all feel the need for wonder
We still want to be reminded that the pain is worth the thunder
Sometimes when I lose my grip, I wonder what to make of heaven
All the times I thought to reach up
All the times I had to give
Babies underneath their beds
Hospitals that cannot treat all the wounds that money causes,
All the comforts of cathedrals
All the cries of thirsty children - this is our inheritance
All the rage of watching mothers - this is our greatest offense
Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God
And then we talk about other things. Is it just making background noise? Or is it because life does still go on? Or is it foreground noise, because we don’t want to hear what is going on in the background? Is that cowardice, or bravery, or something else? I don’t know.
But it’s what I do, because it’s the best thing I can think of.
Comments»
Oh, really? Wow, we really like the same things, don’t we? I also like that ‘possible pirates’ part.
I wrote an alliterative poem for my exams this week. Tell me what you think of it! It is pretty funny. I don’t think I am very good at alliteration…oh well!
In the icy night of the northern breeze
When the water is wild and white
When the wind drives the waves up onto the cliffs
And the storm sweeps over the seas
Then the raging tempest and the treacherous rocks
Shake the ships and shatter them on the shore
And the boats are blown about and broken
And many a man may meet with his death
When the water-nymphs wait for their ill-fated prey.
In those boiling seas in the blast of the storm
In the dead of the night in that den of danger
A lone ship sailed, driven before the wind
Onto cruel death, onto those dreadful cliffs
At the time of the tempest as destiny would have it
Many were the luckless lives that were lost
And that fateful ship was shivered and shaken
And the beams of the doomed vessel broke asunder -
The vessel that bore the Viking Bow.
Its from a book I read this term about a Viking Bow so I put a scene of it into into verse and I thought you would be interested. You usually like that kind of thing, right? ;))
By the way, I am reading a book right now, Ivanhoe by Walter Scott. Have you ever read it before? I am almost done with it and I am trying to get people’s opinions on it.
Sincerely,
Raora
P.S. I really like that song you posted. It was very encouraging. Thanks.