Increase My Status, I Was Birthed In Pain

-------/The Thoughts of Jabez/

What can you do in life but
love, make friends or
hate and make enemies and
eat until youre satisfied, or rob until you've quelled
the hunger pangs tormenting you.
Plow the field for purpose
raise a family then bestow the same precarious
fate upon your progeny
you fight hard for everything you own
to amass wealth, just to garrison your possessions
for fear of loss
then you gaze at the moon and for respite and fall asleep
days cascade into one another
time passes so quickly it escapes your notice
and one day you realize you cant account for all the time spent
you come to troubled,
your heart languishing in your sleep with regrets
of wasted potential (of being a profligate)
this is what the elders tell me
and mom tells me my birth was excruciating;
that Im one of the lucky ones (that I best take advantage
of the extraordinary circumstances dealt)
because we were both likely to miss our chance
to live a full life, and possess our dreams
All I want now, all I could ever want is
for God to enlarge the territory I have and
make me colossal, immeasurable, mammoth
bless me all the days of my life free from evil
that his hand would be with me
and make my life count for something
not just a boy serving as a harbinger of pain
to a broken world



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Jabez was more honorable than his brothers. His mother had named him Jabez, saying, "I gave birth to him in pain." Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, "Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain." And God granted his request. (1 Chronicles 4:9-10)