There was a time I was angry with God
And I wanted to challenge him to a fight
I had cried out to him on those dark lonely nights when sleep eluded me but he never answered.
He stayed quiet like the darkness.
You see, I was tormented and needed his refuge
but he stayed silent each time I called.
I wondered what kind of God would watch his child crushed down by pillars of heavy concrete
and have their skin pecked at by starved vultures but still not interfere.
If he was the Almighty, he would surely move a few pieces and the tables would turn.
Or, maybe, he would come like a gentle song in a cold wind
and the sound would comfort me.
But no, he stayed silent like an owl on a lamp post.

Slowly, my anger suffocated me and filled me with the rage of a whirlwind
And all I wanted to do was punch through his ribs with the force of a King's chariot escaping from the battlefield.
Maybe that would shock him out of his daydream and get his attention
Plus, I knew he could take it.
And so I called him out to the arena
the one where I had been crowned the wrestling champion when I was 12.
I asked him to step out of the shadows in the sky if he indeed is God
But just like before, he remained silent
As he always was when I made love to my lover in the violent rains of April.
I screamed his name again, this time calling him Jehovah.
Thinking that his insolence was because he might be picky with names
And, just like before, he did not come.

Finally, I stared up at the sky, straight into the sun
because I wanted to show him that I was a more than a man now
And the sun did not scare me
I believed that maybe if I stared long enough, he would blink
And reveal himself behind the sun.
I shouted out to him and beat my chest five times like an angry ape.
Remembering how Jacob had once wrestled him from dusk till dawn and did not relent
So I thought that I too, stood a chance.
This time, I wanted to be the one to break his hip
And make an eternal name for myself
But God did not show up.
Only He knows why.

©Maathe