Boundless Gratitude: Songs of the week

• MP3 play whole song, hi-fi (broadband)
• MP3 play whole song, lo-fi (modem)

Written in 1999 and recorded in 2000 on the Musical Storytelling CD, this song of the week is dedicated to the memory of James Byrd, Jr., and countless other victims, known and unknown, of the same sickness. A tribute will be held for Byrd in SF this Sunday. Details can be found here.

Dear God,

If you have placed a curse on Pharaoh, please remove it.
Because Old Pharaoh was an ancestor of mine.
And the ones who taught me Pharaoh’s curse have bade me
To leave the thoughts of their ancestral wrongs behind.

If you have placed a curse on Satan, please remove it.
They made their Satan black and strong to look like me.
But they told me that they look you, which somehow doesn’t ring quite true.
So please God, from their curses set me free.

I’ve been taught to curse my ancestors and images.
It seems to entertain the ones who love to curse.
God please release me from their love of my destruction.
Restore the peace and love you gave to me at birth.

Please do not curse the ones who nurtured cursing in me.
And do not curse those who enslaved me in their fields.
Curse not even those who steal my soul with drugs, booze and brutality.
They don’t need your curses, God. They need to heal.

I call both You and me in names that sound so foreign.
From foreign lands in many foreign tongues I call.
Sometimes I wonder what I’m saying God. Does it make any sense?
God, it’s Amazing Grace that I can speak at all.

Free me from their need to curse and exploit scapegoats
And from their cotton-pickin’ prison industries.
Show me the Peaceful One these killers claim to worship.
They think it’s them. I know it’s You. So set me free.

Manifest this heart of mine with freedom, peace and love
Unbounded by the curse of their deserted virtues.
Help me walk Your way again and speak to all as if to friends.
Your peace and healing are some things we all could use.

Amen