My Lady

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