“Gimme hate, Lord,” he whimpered. “I’ll take hate any day. But don’t give me love. I can’t take no more love, Lord. I can’t carry it… It’s too heavy. Jesus, you know. You know all about it. Ain’t it heavy? Jesus? Ain’t love heavy? Don’t you see, Lord? You own son couldn’t carry it. If it killed Him, what You think it’s gonna do to me? Huh? Huh?”
~ From Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
And what we mean when we pray for hate, Lord, is not that others would hate us. We’re used to that already. Of course, if you want to make others hate us more that’s okay, too. But what we really mean, Lord, is that we want you to teach us to hate others. This love is just too much. It’s fucking heavy, if you’ll pardon our French, Lord. It’s more than we can bear.
Because this love isolates us. And, Lord, isn’t love supposed to be something that brings us all together? But it doesn’t. It just drives us further and further away from our friends and families. And we can’t handle this kind of love on our own. So, give us hate. If we could learn to be a little more hateful than we’ll be a whole lot more comfortable. We’ll have a lot more friends too, Lord, and we’re tired of being alone.
And don’t you promise us new life, Lord? If you do then why is it that this love is killing us? What happened to the easy yoke, Lord? This one is more than we can bear.