Wednesday, January 5, 2022

God Without Apologies

We must calm the angry God
By withdrawing our hands
From the flesh of fresh faces.

We have forgotten that,
As if the brutal truth
Is just some demon inside
That must be exorcised
The same as it was created,
Glaring full in on our sin,
Ye children of
What should be the God of love.

As if the God of every day
Doesn’t kill the weak for fun
Or set in motion consequence in misery
For every selfish thought and deed.

It’s we who are the sun
Shining equally upon 
All we fail to understand,
Taking all our cues from shadows
That form outlines only when
The arc of afternoon’s set in.

If the kudzu won’t stop growing
And the brown rats multiply
How is that our problem?
A helpful God explains
They must be eradicated
With ruthless dispassion ...

All the creatures are disposable
To the I,
Which may not, after all,
Include me
Except in some higher vines
Where I can see the master plan
Above the violence 
Necessary for it to be.

It doesn’t matter, you see,
The individual piece,
That is why one must be kind
To hearts expendable like ours,
For there is no other
Custodian to the free.

How viciously God’s whiskers
Raise at that, and how little
Such judgement matters.