Chapter 37: A Psalm of the Golden Year

 To the Lector: A Psalm of Reflection by Blake, contemplating the passage of time and the search for renewal.

 

A new age beckons me,

For soon I will approach a milestone

Closer to a man of great age

Than a boy of youth.

 

Hairs have begun to fall from my head,

And the glory of my youth fades from sight.

Soon, I will celebrate my golden birthday,

A day I will see but once.

I will cherish it and find joy in my Creator,

For Yahweh has been good to me

All the days of my life,

And I will rejoice in Him forevermore.

 

The days of being two score and three years have ended,

And this saddens me.

I stand as an elder among the youth of Gen Z,

A generation I perceive as spiritually weak,

Which stirs sorrow within me.

 

Men are consumed with vanity,

And women, seeming mere copies of one another,

Distress my heart.

How can I guide them,

Being the most advanced in experience

And possessing wealth beyond theirs?

How can I show them

That wealth is merely a means of ease

And not worth relentless pursuit?

 

For when I am strong it is because I have known weakness,

And Christ has endowed me with this strength.

I am fearless because I have faced fear,

Wise and experienced

Because I was once foolish and ignorant.

 

Now, possessing everything,

I reflect on how once I had nothing of value.

Yet twenty-three years from now,

I know I will regret the things I did not do

More than those I did.

In my youth, I wished I had done more.

Thus, I shall cast off the bowlines,

Sail away from the safe harbor of my comfort,

Catch the trade winds in my sails,

And sail against the current.

 

I will explore,

Dream beyond the boy with a dream,

And expand beyond all discoveries I have made.

 

For the willing lector, know this:

Everything in the universe is about love,

And Christ’s love for us.

And when it isn’t about love,

It is about the absence of it.

I live in this absence

And have grown weary of it.

 

Concerning the matter of having everything,

Though technically, I don’t possess everything,

It feels as if I do.

Once, I had nothing, I was nothing—

Until I awoke from my slumber.

I knew only nothing,

Then suddenly there was something,

And it felt like everything.

 

But now, where do I go from here?

Here I stand, feeling as if I am everything,

Yet feeling lost.

This is the root of my despair.

 

I was given something far greater

Than everything I once knew.

And without reason, it was ripped away from me.

Now, everything I have feels like nothing

Because the one thing greater than everything

Was taken from me.

 

Eleanor, why have you done this unto me?

What grievous act did I commit against you

To cause me such pain?

It has been nearly a year,

And still these dark shadows loom.

You laugh at my pain beside my only enemy

And offered no solace.

You moved on while I fled

To a new land to escape such pain.

How did I let three months

Change the course of my life

And control my inner thoughts?

 

Eleanor, you gave me everything when I had nothing.

But then, you took it away.

I hate nothing, and yet I loathe everything.

Where now can lasting joy be found?

Will the Lord restore peace to my heart?

 

But yea, the Lord once told a prophet of old, Isaiah, saying,

“Remember ye not the former things,

Neither consider the things of old.

Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth;

Shall ye not know it?

I will even make a way in the wilderness,

And rivers in the desert.”

 

I await this new thing, mighty Yahweh.

How long must I wait

And wallow in my own self-pity?

Deliver me by any means necessary,

And I will rejoice,

For You, oh Lord, will deliver me one day.

 

Perhaps, in the golden year of my days on earth,

You will deliver me this new thing,

Whatever it may be.

 

For the age of two score and three years

Started with joy beyond all my experiences.

I have experienced more than all

Who have gone before me, considering my age.

Then darkness came in a blink of an eye,

And I tried to run from it.

For a season, my running was victorious,

Then it returned.

Can it be defeated?

 

There are moments when this darkness hides,

Then it returns to me in moments of joy.

This enemy I cannot defeat on my own.

Destroy it, my God.

I am weak and weary.

 

Now I can see this new age,

A golden age, knocking at my door.

It is unclear what exactly it may be.

Please Lord, let it be light and not darkness.

Let me find joy again in the small things

And find peace in all my life.

 

So now I wait as the clock continues to tick

In the uttermost darkness of my own mind.

Arise, oh Lord,

Defeat this darkness in this golden age.