"Jesus, Are You Real?"

Jesus, are you real?
Did we make you up?
Is salvation what you want
Or is faith enough?
 
Do you know where I'm bound?
Do you know who I am?
Are you just a word I use
When I don't understand?
 
Standing like a statue in the sea
In a little truck stop in Tennessee
And bombs are crashing down in waves
On a giant TV screen
 
And I am struck
I cannot move to make it stop
What can I do? People are dying in their beds
While this flag flies over our heads
 
Jesus, are you stronger than a loaded gun?
I'm beginning to believe you're not the only one
Strong enough to show your love, strong enough to give
Strong enough to go through hell, strong enough to live
 
And all night long I sat with you
In a darkened hospital room
And nurses checked in by the hour
I was made aware of a higher power
 
And how this fragile life we live
Is not ours to keep but ours to give
What in the world am I gonna do
If anything should happen to you?
 
All I do is doubt you, God
All is do is love you, God
All I do is question you
What else can I do?
 
This world was never solid ground
The past is coming back around
All I do is search for you
What else can I do?
 
And when I say I search for you
I mean I search for peace
I search for hope, I search for love
And one day for release
 
Jesus, my life does not feel the same
New things happen everyday, things I can't explain
But I am not a man of faith, I'm a man of truth
But is this feeling in my heart, is this feeling proof?
 
When you do not know, you know
And when you know, you do not know
And when you think you do, you die
And when you do not think, you grow
 
Are we left here in the dark
Or are we left here in the light?
It seems to me that both are true
And it's up to us to know what's right
 
All I do is doubt you, God
All is do is love you, God
All I do is question you
What else can I do?
 
This world was never solid ground
Religion cannot help me now
All I do is search for you
What else can I do?
 
And when I say I search for you
I mean I search for peace
I search for hope, I search for love
And one day for release
 
God give me strength to accept the things
That I just cannot know
And even when I lose control
I will not let you go 

 MASON JENNINGS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3sU0Dn5Bgk

LIFE WHILE-YOU-WAIT

Performance without rehearsal.

Body without alterations.

Head without premeditation.

I know nothing of the role I play.

I only know it's mine. I can't exchange it.

I have to guess on the spot

just what this play's all about.

Ill-prepared for the privilege of living,

I can barely keep up with the pace that the action demands.

I improvise, although I loathe improvisation.

I trip at every step over my own ignorance.

I can't conceal my hayseed manners.

My instincts are for happy histrionics.

Stage fright makes excuses for me, which humiliate me more.

Extenuating circumstances strike me as cruel.

Words and impulses you can't take back,

stars you'll never get counted,

your character like a raincoat you button on the run –

the pitiful results of all this unexpectedness.

If only I could just rehearse one Wednesday in advance,

or repeat a single Thursday that has passed!

But here comes Friday with a script I haven't seen.

Is it fair, I ask

(my voice a little hoarse,

since I couldn't even clear my throat offstage).

You'd be wrong to think that it's just a slapdash quiz

taken in makeshift accommodations. Oh no.

I'm standing on the set and I see how strong it is.

The props are surprisingly precise.

The machine rotating the stage has been around even longer.

The farthest galaxies have been turned on.

Oh no, there's no question, this must be the premiere.

And whatever I do

will become forever what I've done.

***Wislawa Szymborska

trans.  Clare Cavanagh and Stanislaw Baranczak