Poem: September 25, 2019

Proof

If there isn't a god, which
(let's face it) is a proposition
that modern life has made
increasingly easy to accept,
given the advances of science,
and the normalization of secular
thought, of humanism, and our
love of moral ambiguity and our
desensitization to evil and the
horrors of people generally
and the many awful messes that
we have made across the planet,
and our stated respect for any
and all points of view, and our
repeated failure to raise our own
standards which does anything
but argue for any kind of plan,
purpose, or the presence of
a big-T Truth, and blah, blah, blah.

If there isn't a god, whether
formed in some image we would
recognize or not, whether in the
form of light or of love or anger,
whether intimate and personal or
ambivalent and disengaged, or
whether mighty and omnipotent
or a whisper in the stillness,
whether omniscient and ordered
or chaotic and capricious, if, if.

If there isn't a god, then in times
of crisis when the car we are
driving jumps into a dead spin
across three lanes of traffic or
when our definition of love has
just walked out the door or
when we realize the terrible and
guaranteed consequences of our
own careless decisions, in these
slashing razorblades of our lives,
who are we praying to for hope,
for safety, for justice and mercy?

If there isn't a god, then why
can we imagine perfection, and
why can we see our helplessness
to achieve it, and why do we ache
for worlds beyond the one we know?
Why do we tell so many stories
about wardrobe portals and rabbit
holes and gated cities in the sky?
What is the point of our comparisons,
and what are we comparing to?

If there isn't a god, then what
are we feeling when cool water
washes over our skin, or when, in
the dark edges of sleep, we hear
thunder rolling in the distance,
or when we press our ear to a child
or a lover's chest and hear the echo
of our own hearts? What are we
feeling, when we know that those
we've lost, still visit and fill our
spaces? What, I ask, if not god?