Jack Pelham

At the end of the day,
They do not think it
Their responsibility
To understand,
But only to nod along.

And this explains
A great deal.

In popular Christianity, many have been taught that
To say they are all in is to be all in.

It is for them a religion of mere declaration,
Beyond which God does most all the work
And they themselves are mostly unaccountable.

You can call me crazy, but I submit
That a person who would think
Such a religion as that to be right
Has got himself seriously twisted.

And such a person would agree with me
If we were discussing the same principles
As they relate to a different subject,
For who in this world thinks that a spouse
Or an athlete or an employee is all in
Just for having said so?

He is frustrated that they will not heed
His corrections on how they have
Misinterpreted the Bible—
As if it were a serious
Cognitive error—
When really
It is much
Worse.
It does not
Occur to him
That the reason
They are in error is
That they have ignored
Also the counsel of the rest
Of the scriptures of God himself.
And so fails the will beyond the mind.

Listen closely to me and I will tell you
The terrible difference between two men
That sets them apart as Light and Darkness.

The one sees self-correction as a life-giving duty
By which he blesses himself and those around him.

The other counts it useless and a betrayal of his own soul.

With his head laid on the block of public service
And the axe within the easy reach of the crowd
He dares to speak a truth that is sure to be
Met with apathy, delight, terror, and rage
By the factions who stand before him,
As depends on their dispositions—
And most of them not the fans
Of truth that they assume
Themselves to be.
But truth is his
Philosophy
And here
He is.

After suffering years of nagging guilt
I’m now reconsidering whether I should
Cut myself some slack
For I have observed of late
That the deer do not make their beds.

I believe I could get filthy rich
If I were willing to teach under-developed minds
To feel good about their under-development.

A thousand lessons pass the ears
And a hundred the lips
To the one that finds a home in the heart.

And hardly anyone knows that we could—
If we wanted—
Learn a thing the first time.

As he heads to the barn
The evening sun dips down
Beneath the western clouds
For one last look at the day
And washes warm where he may
Across the uncluttered earth
Casting long those evening shadows
Beyond the obstinate things
That refuse to clear the way.

He is a fool and brilliant!—

A fool for using his unreliable human mind
For drawing conclusions about this world—

And brilliant for learning how to do it better and better,
And for reassessing his conclusions from time to time,
Where most simply set it and forget it.