Job 10
Job Frames His Plea to God
or
Created for This?
based on Job 10
why did you let me be born
Job 10:18
Job 10:18
I am weary of life. I'll complain of this strife;
let my soul, so embittered, cry out.
And to God, let me say, Don't condemn me this way,
let me know what my charge is about.
Are you pleased to oppress the one thing you could bless,
by rejecting the work of your hands?
While I struggle with trial, will you sit back and smile
at the wicked with all of their plans?
Are your eyes made of flesh? Do they see something less
than man's anguish and pain from within?
Are your days like my peers with our limited years —
that you'd eagerly search for my sin?
For although I am free of the guilt ascribed me
there is no one to save me from you.
From my toes to my heart, you have fashioned each part —
now those same hands would tear me in two?
Please remember that day when you formed me from clay;
you'd return me to dust now so soon?
Did you not pour me out like poured milk from a spout;
make me curdle like cheese in the womb?
You then covered me in my remarkable skin,
knit together my sinew with bone.
You gave life and your love, kept me safe from above —
and my spirit from dangers unknown.
All these things you've concealed now have all been revealed,
and your secretive thoughts have been spilt:
you have noted each time that I've sinned — like a crime,
yet you will not forgive me my guilt.
Whether guilty or right — it's the same in your sight;
I'm ashamed and I'm filled with self-hate.
If I showed just one ounce of my pride, you would pounce
like a lion — your powers are great.
With new witnesses now you're more angry somehow,
sending hardships in wave after wave.
Why, then, even exist if I'm born to all this?
Why not send me from womb to the grave?
Since my days are so few I'd like one without you,
for one moment of joy — just a breath,
ere these trials adjourn and I never return
from the land of the shadow of death.
In a land veiled in black, where there's no turning back;
filled with shadows, yet empty and stark.
Where the night and the day are alike in the way
that the light is the same as the dark.
let my soul, so embittered, cry out.
And to God, let me say, Don't condemn me this way,
let me know what my charge is about.
Are you pleased to oppress the one thing you could bless,
by rejecting the work of your hands?
While I struggle with trial, will you sit back and smile
at the wicked with all of their plans?
Are your eyes made of flesh? Do they see something less
than man's anguish and pain from within?
Are your days like my peers with our limited years —
that you'd eagerly search for my sin?
For although I am free of the guilt ascribed me
there is no one to save me from you.
From my toes to my heart, you have fashioned each part —
now those same hands would tear me in two?
Please remember that day when you formed me from clay;
you'd return me to dust now so soon?
Did you not pour me out like poured milk from a spout;
make me curdle like cheese in the womb?
You then covered me in my remarkable skin,
knit together my sinew with bone.
You gave life and your love, kept me safe from above —
and my spirit from dangers unknown.
All these things you've concealed now have all been revealed,
and your secretive thoughts have been spilt:
you have noted each time that I've sinned — like a crime,
yet you will not forgive me my guilt.
Whether guilty or right — it's the same in your sight;
I'm ashamed and I'm filled with self-hate.
If I showed just one ounce of my pride, you would pounce
like a lion — your powers are great.
With new witnesses now you're more angry somehow,
sending hardships in wave after wave.
Why, then, even exist if I'm born to all this?
Why not send me from womb to the grave?
Since my days are so few I'd like one without you,
for one moment of joy — just a breath,
ere these trials adjourn and I never return
from the land of the shadow of death.
In a land veiled in black, where there's no turning back;
filled with shadows, yet empty and stark.
Where the night and the day are alike in the way
that the light is the same as the dark.
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