My God, My Tourniquet

I recently received the Evanescence Fallen album for my birthday. The mood of the songs are the strongest I have ever heard. Amy Lee has developed a tremendous ability to portray intense spiritual struggles.

Consider the lyrics to her song "Tourniquet". The words of the song present a spirit in serious self-examination. The song is in some ways like a dark hymn. It could almost be sung by a Moravian or perhaps a Baptist congregation.

The voice is edgy like a person standing on top of a building looking down. Whereas most people have one foot in 'despair comforted by distraction' and 'committed love and devotion', this voice is ready to go all the way -but it has yet to decide which direction to take.

I'm dying,
Praying,
Bleeding,
Screaming.
Am I too lost to be saved ?
Am I too lost ?

Most people who call themselves Christians believe God has saved them from their sin. Or Adam's sin. Or the doctrine of sin. "Well, that good man has saved someone from something...". Finding a person who confesses they were lost is not easy. I hear so few testimonies these days to say as much.

But here is the voice of someone asking, "Am I too lost to be saved?". And so everything is on the table -the confession is full-blown, and the stakes are infinite.

The singer is strangely present to herself. She isn't saying highly, "One day I'll do such and such and become this and associate with these people ...". She isn't saying, "I was once this person ...". She is saying, "This is me ... this is who I am! Aaah!".

Do you remember me ?
Lost for so long.
Will you be on the other side ?
Will you forgive me ?

This is not a voice that says smugly like so many, "Of course God could forgive me." This voice has trouble accepting that God has forgiven her. This promise of God is not like a forgone conclusion to her, but a profound mystery.

It is something incomprehensible to her.

If I had to choose between listening to a theologian who could describe forgiveness in the blaise terms of systematic theology and listening to an alternative rocker describe something unexplainable, indescribable, and mysterious -I would gladly choose the later.

When I turn up the volume of the music and let the words drown out the world around me it seems perfectly clear to me that this is the question that is extended to me -and to all of us. When one has examined the depths of the evil in ones heart, does one believe they will find God on the other side of death?

My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.

My wounds cry for the grave.
My soul cries, for deliverance.
Will I be denied ?
Christ! Tourniquet! My suicide.

I admit I struggle with the last two words. The tourniquet metaphor gives me the image of something painful that brings healing. In what way does healing produce (or require) suicide?

Is the singer so deceived as to see suicide as a rescue from the anguish of her soul? As she struggles to confront the supreme chill of eternity, does she think that in death the eternal part of her -judging and evaluating her actions- will somehow go away? Is she deliberately forgetting that eternity goes on and is only transfigured by mortal death?

I am not sure.

Or is it that the tourniquet -the painful healing of God she asks herself about- demands for her to die away from everything in order to find the life God has in store for her? Is she looking decisively at her cross and saying, "I am taking this up!"?

Hard to say. It is as Paul says: we cannot know the thoughts of another. We only see glimpses. The rest is often a reflection of who we are.

I have never heard a voice with the gravity of Amy Lee. It expresses profound sorrow and yet is never willing to abandon hope. It longs to believe God is watching and He has not given up on her.

Isn't she a lot like you and me?

I tried to kill the pain,
But only brought more.
(So much more)
I'm dying,
And I'm pouring, crimson regret, and betrayal.

I'm dying,
Praying,
Bleeding,
Screaming.
Am I too lost to be saved ?
Am I too lost ?
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.

Do you remember me ?
Lost for so long.
Will you be on the other side ?
Will you forgive me ?

I'm dying,
Praying,
Bleeding,
Screaming.

Am I too lost to be saved ?
Am I too lost ?

My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.

(Return to me salvation)
(I want to die!)

My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.
My God! My Tourniquet,
Return to me salvation.

My wounds cry for the grave.
My soul cries, for deliverance.
Will I be denied ?
Christ! Tourniquet! My suicide.

The Nightingale Song

"The spirit of the ring obeys the one who has the ring whether he is Aladdin or a Noureddin, and he who has the wealth has it regardless of how he got it. It is different in the world of the spirit."
Johannes de Silento

Of all the characters in film perhaps the hardest to understand is that noble, young woman Cinderella. The more I study her - how she hoped against hope while enduring the malice of her step-family - the more amazed I am. The film is very difficult for me to watch.

Walt Disney was surely a student of the Copenhagen school ... studying the works of Anderson and Kierkegaard. He certainly had an eye for subtlety and the many ways the spirit expresses itself.

Perhaps the highest point of the animation is the Nightingale song. We are taken to the music room to hear the singing of the step-sisters. They are poor singers, yes, even to a comic extreme. However Disney is trying to show us something deeper and more profound, and it is here one finds his mastery of story-telling.

"Sing sweet Nightingale ... Ah ah ah ah Aaaah!"

The half-smile ... the affectation of the flute player ... the closed eyes ... the smugness ... these girls are singing for an audience. They are singing not because they find their song meaningful. They are trying to find meaning in the eyes of others. The mother emphasizes practice to make them sound better to others as the real problem gets worse.

Trouble is brewing. The flutist catches her finger on a note. She pulls hard on her hand - sending the flute into her sister's face. The conflict escalates: the flute is stolen and becomes a weapon. Whatever control these girls have over their music, they have little control over themselves. Only the external intervention of the mother can bring the argument to rest while the girls remain ... restless.

The scene changes to the downstairs entry where Cinderella is scrubbing the floors. She is singing Sweet Nightingale - the same song her sisters were singing. And yet the song is completely different.

Oh sing sweet nightingale ...
Sing sweet nightingale.
Sing sweet nightingale ... to me !

The bubbles begin to lift and fall with the melody. We see reflections of the young girl floating around her. Reflections of a woman alone, abused by her family. Just as in every reflection, Cinderella gains the chance of seeing herself. And the woman she sees reflected in the music and the work upon herself is ... glad and at peace.

Beautiful.

As in the music room above, trouble is not far away. Lucifer the cat has spread dirt around the tile floor. Cinderella is angry and chases the cat away. But she is not defeated precisely because she does not despair.

In both scenes we find work, trouble, and the nightingale song. And could anything be more different!