Deus Misereatur

Unwilling to accept responsibility

for his own actions, man's first

collective decision was to create

the Creator. In that Supreme Being

would rest the authority to

affect us all, that Spirit would

move us to behave as we do. We

gratefully give ourselves up to

His protection, His mercy; ourselves

giving no quarter, showing no mercy

to those who deny His existence.

Time has changed our perceptions

for once a whole pantheon of gods

rose to our needs, gave way to an

Aton, finally a Jehovah, heir of El.

Man is adaptable, and with his

changing imperatives he recognizes

the need to alter allegiance to

a new supremacy. In this era the

computer is the latest manifestation

of Divine Presence and the seat of

bureaucracy its temples.

Number after number is sacrificed to

appease the god whose fodder we are.

Recognizing safety in anonymity, we

embrace the liturgy of ciphers

and comforted, we exist blindly,

in a  uniform dance of submission.

c.1979

 

Et Al

Strange how the righteous

by some quirk of nature

envision themselves

the embodiment of

the True Spirit

are invariably

prophets of gloom

lavishing condemnation

on all us sinners.

Oh save me not from

damnation

but from the good

and the godly

eyes cast upon

the heavens

feet stumbling through

cowpies of pietical incest.

c.1979

What If?

These are eerily sinister times, a vast and 

evil miasma has settled over the world we 

thought we knew and knew we depended

upon for our existence as a stable environment

that would never desert its role as our haven.

But the bleak condition of our world has

suddenly closed in -- threatening humanity 

in the relentless stalking of a silent killer

emerging on every continent on the globe. 

We sleep fitfully as fearful nightmares invade

our rest, and when we awaken realize that the

nightmare has not dissipated -- but re-entered 

our lives as inexorably as the fear that descends

smothering our minds with terrified disbelief.

Yet -- wait -- can this really be happening?

What if this dread horror is truly an ongoing 

nightmare of global proportions, and what we 

are convinced is reality is but a manifestation 

of a dark psychosis so far reaching that it has

captured the boundless imagination of our minds?

 

Lost and Found

Look! There they are! There, and there
and there. Be still, my heart... Ah, yes
the usual suspects. Furtive? No, triumphant!
It's nature's celebrated conspiracy of spring
renewal, and all her accomplices have
been alerted, from the sun to the spinning
Earth, the wind and the rain. A splendid
group effort of absolutely divine direction.
Winter has taken of late to creeping away
while obstinately refusing to pick up speed
but the inevitable is the inevitable and even
that cranky misery knows it's time is up.
Snow and ice both receding under the sun's
imperious glare, the soothing rain and rising
temperatures. Warming the soil, thawing
the latent vegetation slowly awakening
beginning their green-spear thrusts toward
a warming atmosphere prepared to receive
them as nature nurtures the release clockwork
of another spring bringing food and flowers
alive once again, joy to gardeners' hearts.

Biodegradation

We are a conflicted species in many
ways, an inheritance bequeathed to all
living things endowed with the capacity
to adapt so they may above all things
survive in an atmosphere that offers
that capacity to those with few scruples
over gathering sustenance depriving
other life forms in the process. We can
always point to nature as responsible for
our belligerence across borders clinging
to tribe and clan, perceiving all others
as competitors, opponents, enemies
whose plans of territorial aggression
must be countered, lest we suffer for we
are the righteous and all others are the
blights upon humanity. By nature we are
also gregarious finding comfort and no
little security in the company of others
like ourselves -- none others need apply.
Now, alarmingly suddenly a new enemy
has surfaced whose conquest of humanity
makes no distinctions between borders
and we quail before its onslaught, felling
us one by one in horrific numbers. Now
we protect ourselves by disowning the
company of others, cloistering ourselves
in our little caves, quaking with fear.

The Messenger

This is the nature we adore. That
gentler, nurturing, creative aspect
and not the capricious, indifferent
creator who devised an original
blueprint for existence then left her 
creations to fend for themselves
against the predatory pathogens she
also created as part of her ineffable
kingdom of multitudinous lifeforms
many she abandons to a brief fate
others she idly observes insisting on 
surviving using the very tools she
invested in them, varying from one 
creature to another, but all, each and 
every one interrelated and mutually
benefiting despite sacrifices beyond
their capacity to escape. Gentle nature 
graciously offers symbols of rebirth 
and hope, in the first spears of plants 
probing their presence out of the thawed 
soil in winter's hoary wake and the 
ethereal trilling of a cardinal exuberantly 
informing the world that yes, winter 
has finally departed and spring arrived.

Sleep Walking

This stiff-upper-lip voice

floating at me

through my radio

this upper-class British voice

that I alternately envy and deride

describing new research

into the incidence of sleep-walking

and one of the symptoms

one of the ways you can tell

is by the victim's (?) GLAZED EYES

Is that how?

Could be my life is one

whole sleep-walking experience.

And he goes on to say

it's a fallacy, they don't die of shock

if precipitately

brought out of their sleep-walking

and goes on to give an example

of some woman who had an 'unfortunate'

tendency to sleep-walk

in the wee hours of the morning

- naked - and that's

how her husband invariably discovered her

walking the streets, naked.

"It distressed her husband enormously"

the voice said. Well, yes it would.

But women are like that

always dreaming of

walking the streets

though few of us do it

naked

and fewer yet

die of mortification when

precipitately brought to reality.

 c.1979