The Throng

February 6

THE THRONG

The more people I meet, the more vehemently I do not believe in God. The tidal wave of human ignorance hits me and the sheer and repetitive force of it is more than my single souled craft can bear. Cyclical, coincidental tragedy coupled with purposeful meanness, barbed with arrogance and misaligned fear hold my child's faith under a scalding bath of realism. What to do? I do not know.

The fragility and perniciousness of life war with each other, though loss wins out. What can I use to keep myself from withdrawal into despondent hibernation? Looking for glimmers of goodness in the sea of overwhelming depravity is not cutting it with me. Mystery as an explanation is not working either. I am not a retarded five-year-old; I am a despairing thirty-eight-year-old and I am tired of game-playing and coyness. I want a God to arrive, not with explanations, but solutions. I am not looking for a punishing parent to send errant persons to bed without supper. I am looking for the equation of repair, the dance steps to healing. I am yearning for a global twelfth step, a universal attunement and galactic spiritual awakening. And by the way, I want it now.

If you can’t write, sing.

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More Than Less

There is a difference between

doing G-d’s will and winning,

though sometimes they look the same.

Skin deep appearance or monetary prowess

share no border with the will of G-d,

but these can stack as transparencies

seeming invisible to the uninitiated practitioner.

The organs exist and blood flows in the living thing

and the shell is hard, lifeless; though it glints.

Success can be the mantel of right compliance

or the shroud of something deadly.

I mustn’t be pushed or pulled by the desire

of accolades or acceptance,

nor shall I flee into a trap for fear of ridicule or rejection.

The lacerations of emotional infliction,

unloving judgments and imprudent fallout

cause me to flinch in the face of changing focus

and relinquishing hope of control.

I am powerless over everything and responsible to everything.

Anything else is incidental

and with loving help will work out if I do not panic.

Ah, to love myself as G-d loves me.