Revisiting Genesis, episode twelve: Prayer, Aerialist (2016)

Oreet Ashery

6 mins 27 secs

Prayer
Do you hear me God?
God do you hear me?
Can you see me God?
God you are in me
Pungent smell of self-neglect
Didn't know that we'd have to change…
change our underwear and socks everyday
for Self-belief is scarce
We are homeless,
children of the government
and how we live is how we die
only more so
Woman's death is not any old death,
a woman's death is not normal
Let us make a woman disappear
into a flat black smudge
You seem stitched up in the net
she smiles and cries in the deep deep web
chased, erased, stay in bed
how we live is how we die
Maybe more so
Trolls make goose bumps come alive
Trolls make goose pups come alive
roll and troll and troll and roll and troll
with a laptop on your back
How much? The child asks –
for a digital afterlife?
With the ashes kept for tattoos
or a brooch? Or just as it comes?
Just as it comes the child replies
rise and fall, fall and rise
How we die is how we live
Is this our real life?
Will you break me in this digital life?
Can you hand me over to the afterlife?
Can I have you as mine tomorrow night?
Save me from all this fun
Find me somewhere in the archives of mess
present me in the show
would you Hold me. Grieve me. Love me for now
love, love me, for now.

© Lyrics Oreet Ashery, composition and singing by Johnny Parry, 2016