Hands of God | Thoughts on the Edge of Forever

There is a lot of talk flying around these days – and perhaps it has always been there – about how stories have to be full of depth and emotion. Most people equate such stories with “Dark Fiction,” such as The Twilight Saga, Red Dragon, Purge, The Walking Dead, etcetera ad infinitum.

As you, my readers, know by now, these are not stories in which I am interested. I am not interested in stories that drag the audience into the depths of darkness and leave them lying there, moaning and wailing in pain.

I prefer stories that raise the audience up, make them fly in their souls since every human but Warren Worthington III (a.k.a. the X-Men’s Angel) lacks wings.

Yes, there is danger – or rather, risk – in these stories. The Avengers might have lost to Loki in the film, but they fought anyway. Luke may have been killed by Emperor Palpatine before Anakin saved him, Frodo might not have been saved, and on and on, ad infinitum.

But in these stories there is always light after the darkness. Day follows night, rest follows pain, and sorrow eases and eventually fades, to be replaced by the good memories life has to offer us.

I recently began listening to a current singer whose work inspires this feeling of flight in me. She is fairly popular, I understand. Listening to her songs, I can see why. She is Francesca Battistelli, a young lady “who is making it cool” to sing about the Bible and God. Again. Once this was not so strange an occurrence.

I realize that not everyone will enjoy these songs, but it is not in me to keep something I enjoy entirely to myself. Something shared becomes twice as enjoyable as something encountered singularly. So here are the particular songs Mrs. Battistelli performs which I enjoy.

“Free to Be Me”