His party is right, he tells us,
And the other one is wrong—
And they really ought to know better, the idiots.
And for the life of him, he can’t fathom how anybody
Could be that gosh-darn stupid and blockheaded.
And he thanks God he’s not one of them.
And now, dear reader,
Having told you this much,
I leave it to you to discern
From the information given
Whether this man is
A Democrat or a Republican.
What does it say about us
That so many are afraid to ask?
Is it not that we are somehow
Afraid of the answers?
And really, who would want
To live that way—
Scared of reality?
Life in the constant smog
Can make people forget
What a clear day looks like.
Many will reason that Adam and Eve
Had not been ready to receive
The knowledge of good and evil,
And simply partook too soon of something
That would have been altogether
Proper for them—somehow—at a later time.
But I have lately come to wonder
Whether it had not been the very plan of God
That they should begin right away in that
Cavalier discovery of those two ways in which
They had been created naked—
And of what all was to be done about it.
It was the first grand demonstration day—
The result of which being that most of us
Did get dressed in the one way—
Even if having as yet little clue as to the second,
And going around half naked while fully clothed.
Finding no hope
In the beginning,
Some turn to the end—
Clamoring over the Revelation
And eager to find in it—
Or perhaps to imagine—
Something more promising than
That tired, old Genesis—
Long-since abandoned
As of no particular intrigue.
For they are not interested in
Living out their own quests
For which they were made—
But in slipping in upon
The glorious ending
Of someone else’s.
And they have missed—
I think—
The very point of being.
Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness,…
Genesis 1:26a. NIV. See chapter.
He’ll not understand the end
If he has not given himself over
To the beginning.
I’m as practical and pragmatic as the next guy, so when something’s gone wrong, I can often find a suitable workaround. I can even make do with said workout for some time, if need be.
Continue reading
He decides to tell himself what he is like,
And then to believe it.
And he thinks this settles the matter—
As if he could not possibly be wrong.
But he could.
*I chose the image simply because it’s a man looking into the mirror. It just happens to be a depiction of Socrates, however, which fact I didn’t put in its caption for fear of it having any sway over how this piece might be read. The work is listed as: Socrates Looking in a Mirror, print, Bernard Vaillant, after Jusepe de Ribera (called Lo Spagnoletto)
Atop his body sits a box so important
That he takes it with him wherever he goes.
If you want to hide a treasure
Where few are likely to find it,
Hide it behind the work
That few are likely to do.
