CII-CVII

CII.

Geography is destiny, I read.
An island nation optimizes space
with strict traditions meant to save us face
and hierarchies of communal need.

Where land is vast the cowboy struts his stuff.
We have such room to exercise our rights.
Asserting them, we don’t back down from fights.
The individu’l never has enough.

The empty space is filling up with souls,
the frontier long ago reduced to myth.
We must adjust to serve collective goals.

The self-sufficient lie we told ourselves
is cracking from the callous to the pith
to show us just how deep the anger delves.


CIII.

Norovirus sucks.
Nauseated, weary, sick.
Just haiku tonight.


CIV.

The Lenten lack I most acutely feel
is swearing off all purchases online
and even in this week-and-one-half’s time
the impact on my soul is proving real.

Oh, should I splurge and purchase that new book?
Now do I need another game to play?
Or how about a hat St Paddy’s Day?
Decisions such as these have been forsook.

I find the lack of option liberates.
The nonessential lives up to its name.
Insatiability at last abates.

How many things I’ve bought I’ll never need!
How many years I’ve wasted at this game,
so anxious ever to indulge my greed.


CV.

I have a little fire deep within,
an urging anxious ember in my breast
that goads the heart with little thought for rest
aggressively, with just an edge of sin.

It’s driven me my whole life to achieve
to learn and grow and ever question why,
to seek for something right up ‘til I die,
the fear of failure nipping at my sleeve.

Who would I be without this restive drive—
a better, calmer, humbler, peaceful soul?
Perhaps I’d never quite be this alive.

But sometimes in another’s eyes I see
this selfsame hunger for some wilder goal.
At last, my friend, it is not only me.


CVI.

I’m really not that frightened of the devil
although I’ve seen him lurking in the dark.
He simply isn’t up to Michael’s level.
A shadow cannot stand against a spark.

I think when I was younger it was God
who truly put the fear within my head.
I shied away from both His staff and rod
unsure of where I’d land when I was dead.

I look back now with markéd sweet relief
to know that God is Beauty, Truth, and Good.
I might’ve saved some adolescent grief
had I but trusted Jesus as I should.

I now believe that none are left behind
and this has brought me depthless peace of mind.


CVII.

Ganesha, born of woman without man,
lays down his life for his fidelity
thus setting both the earth and heavens free,
restoring order to the cosmic plan.

To die for love unlocks a greater life
to resurrection in some higher form
as Vishnu does his severed head restore
and God adopts the son of His own wife.

The parallels are there for all to hear,
a myth within a myth that tells the Truth,
the harmony of longings loud and clear.

It’s not that all religions are the same
but when the sages seek to speak the sooth
we call as one the One with many names.