Breakup letter to God – David Bazan: Curse Your Branches
Dear Jesus,
I got this CD the other day and I’ve been listening to it non-stop, which is unusual for me these days. It’s that good.It’s by a guy named David Bazan, and the name of the CD is “Curse Your Branches”.
I’ve been a fan of his and his band “pedro the lion” for some time. This is probably his best work he’s ever done, but that’s besides my point. I was giving it my first full listen while driving around doing errands with my 11month old daughter, when the last song came on called “In Stitches“. I sat in my car listening to the words, and wept as I watched my baby daughter sleep. This song breaks my heart in a way no other song has, because song deals with some of the most basic, spiritual questions we as humans have the capacity to ask. It also breaks my heart because this song, and to a larger extent this whole CD is a breakup letter to God.
Faith is a gift, yet it is also a choice, and we can choose to believe or not. Sometimes, when we see all the awful shit that goes on in the world we can’t justify in ourselves the existence of God. I’ve had my days of wondering myself, and I know things will continue to happen that will challenge the very foundation of my faith for the rest of my life. But I’m okay with that. Because I know that life is just that way. Life is tough. Nothing’s guaranteed, nothing is secure, but I do believe that everything is in God’s hands which are much more capable than mine, so I try to trust in God that there is a purpose and reason for everything. And it is in this thought that I wept for my daughter, because she, in all her present beautiful innocence, will grow to see horrors in her lifetime, and will grow to have her sense of God challenged, and will be faced with these same questions that she will have to either find answers for or be content with not knowing. And all I as her flawed and fallen father can do is hold a signpost for her that points the way towards God, and hope and pray that when she has done her questioning, soul searching and spiritual journeying, that she comes through it all with a sense that God is real and present in her life, even in the small things. And it’s not about her knowing God as defined by a particular religion, it’s about her knowing God as the omniscient presence in the universe, yet still concerned with, and active in her life. And that is a simple truth that i fully believe because I’ve been blessed to have experienced God first hand in my life when I was not expecting or asking for it. And i dont know why I’ve been fortunate enough to have an experience when others might not have. Maybe God knew my character enough to know that in my darkest hours, the only thing that would keep me from fully letting go of everything, was the memory of that experience and the fact that i can not deny it.
Ultimately, at the end of the day, I know that life is long and people change, and where I was 10 years ago is not where I am at now, and who knows where I’ll be in 10 years. So when i think about David Bazan and his breakup letter to God, I tend to think that they’ll get back together again someday, because I think he’s asking the right questions. And in time they’ll work things out. God is patient and always ready for us to talk to him again.
In Stitches – David Bazan
my body bangs and twitches
some brown liquor whets my tongue
my fingers find the stitches
firmly back and forth they run
i need no other memory
of the bits of me i left
when all this lethal drinking
is to hopefully forget
about you
i might as well admit it
like i even have a choice
the crew have killed the captain
but they still can hear his voice
a shadow on the water
a whisper in the wind
on long walks with my daughter
who is lately full of questions
about you
when Job asked you the question
you responded “who are you
to challenge your creator?”
well if that one part is true
it makes you sound defensive
like you had not thought it through
enough to have an answer
like you might have bit off
more than you could chew
