Thanks – W.S. Merwin
The video above is an excerpt from Craig Hella Johnson’s oratorio Considering Matthew Shepard. After portraying Shepard’s life and the impact of his death, Johnson sets W.S. Merwin’s poem Thanks. The poem is crafted out of radical, indestructible, weapons-grade gratitude. It is not naive and it is not unaware of evil and death.
I think it’s what Paul is talking about at the end of 1 Thessalonians:
See that no one pays back evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good for one another and for all. Always rejoice, constantly pray, in everything give thanks. For this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Do not extinguish the Spirit. Do not treat prophecies with contempt. But examine all things; hold fast to what is good.
1 Thessalonians 5:15-22 (NET)
In Paul’s writing, in Merwin’s poem, and in Johnson’s setting there’s this sobering recognition of the evil at work in the world as well as a righteous, inexhaustible impulse towards reveling in the goodness of God and God’s creation. In the context of the oratorio, Johnson seems to be saying on behalf of queer people specifically (and I think that it applies to believers) “by the grace of God, we have outlasted your violence and death with our joy and dignity and will do so forever.”
I listen to Johnson’s setting and read Merwin’s words and it makes me grateful to follow Jesus, grateful to be alive, grateful for creativity, grateful to be gay – even in this season of my life, “dark though it is.”
W.S. Merwin • Thanks
Listen
with the night falling we are saying thank you
we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings
we are running out of the glass rooms
with our mouths full of food to look at the sky
and say thank you
we are standing by the water thanking it
standing by the windows looking out
in our directions
back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging
after funerals we are saying thank you
after the news of the dead
whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you
over telephones we are saying thank you
in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators
remembering wars and the police at the door
and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you
in the banks we are saying thank you
in the faces of the officials and the rich
and of all who will never change
we go on saying thank you thank you
with the animals dying around us
our lost feelings we are saying thank you
with the forests falling faster than the minutes
of our lives we are saying thank you
with the words going out like cells of a brain
with the cities growing over us
we are saying thank you faster and faster
with nobody listening we are saying thank you
we are saying thank you and waving
dark though it is
• • •