Job Poem by Gert Strydom

My name is Job and pain and suffering
should rather have been the meaning of it.
In the evenings I look up and search for meaning, even any kind,
and try to read the stars,

try to see Him from whom all things come
while I am still remaining in His service.
The festering wounds on my hands and feet break open
while in pain I walk along a dark road

and in a dream I see Him stretching out His hands to me,
hands on which painful scars are present.
Something breaks right through my thoughts
and when I awake above me the stars are glittering white,

in the moonlight the stars lie winking up to the horizon
but it's as if a light falls down upon me
from the heavens,
as if in an embrace He draws me tightly against His chest.

Still I keep on trusting Him,
and continue to keep Him as the light that I strive after,
as the light of my life
and one morning when I awake all of cares suddenly disappear:

I see that my wife is pregnant when she walks up to me,
my friends bring me presents and flocks of live-stock,
I am cured overnight, with princes waiting to consult me
and then I become really prosperous.