Who Am I and Who Are You

Who are you, my Lord? And what am I standing here as a weather-beaten tombstone, O Lord, reveal yourself to me on the tombstone standing here alone. Long, long ago Cain averted his face from the light, the condemned river, surrounded by a dead Cain laid atop of his own brother, flows into the valley carrying the curse. And the condemned river flows to the dark side of the sun since the time Abel’s blood cried out. My eyes grew so accustomed to the darkness and, thus, though I am no longer able to stand in light, I face you, the Lord of the origin of light, standing here as a tombstone. O Lord, are you the very person whose voice I hear? are you the man who is rolling and tossing on the ground under the out-pouring lashes who moans: “forgive them,” each time I call for aid of my destiny? O Lord, are you the one who crawl on the path that leads to the Place of the Skull in the mixed air of cries as the fools shout, mockeries of the evil ones affront, and the useless tears the women shed? Are you the one who mutters: “forgive them,” while falling under a rootless tree for the weight of the tree is too great to bear? For the good nature of humankind is numbed by the weight of sins too deep to break loose. The emotion of human kind becomes cold and cruel and, therefore, O my Lord, do you groan with pain unbearable: “forgive them,” when those stone-hearted drive spikes pierce your hands with no compunctions? Are you the one who stands as a decaying wooden pillar on atop of Golgotha with a darkening sun on your back to close the shamefully-mistreated hard life, the miserably-humiliated painful life? Are you the benevolent kind-hearted one who looks up at heaven, and at mobs who accused you, appealing with tearful eyes: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” When the wooden pillar collapses from its own weight and darkness falls onto earth to cover the unsightly world, I, the tombstone with no name or epitaph, see a sad image standing atop of the Place of the Skull tightly holding the world’s anguish.