“You could die.”
“I know.” She said looking at me sideways, “Everyday I’m one step closer to death.”
“You’re going to tell us if it’s killing you, right?” I ask void of inflection.
“You’re killing me with this conversation.”
For a second I saw her not as she is, but possibly 10 years younger. Slim body, graceful, freckles, round face plastered with that mischievous smile. I blinked. She wasn’t that way. Time rushed back and I could see the pounds from all the medication. The hard lines of her face and the almost dullness to her eyes. I recognized my lost role as her protector. She’s taller than me. I suddenly felt extremely far away from her.
“That’s not funny.” I said indignantly.
Leaning back, slightly confused she spoke softly, “You can blink now. I’m not going anywhere.”
I couldn’t help that I felt like I was losing her. She aged each time I blinked, I was like the deteriorating flash of the cameras snapping at the Guttenburg Bible.
“I love you.” I blurted out and a slow, creeping silence echoed between us.
“I know.” She repeated, “I’m not going to die right now.”
“Alright.” A long pause grew, as we contemplated what the other was thinking. Pulling at the threadbare couch.
“What would you do?”
“When?”
“If I died.”
“Truth? God,” Running a hand through my hair, “I don’t know – I honestly don’t know.”
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
SCIENCE V. RELIGION
Glory be to the father,
And to the son,
And to the holy spirit.
As it was in the beginning,
I believed that I belonged to an Old Boys Club.
My mind is where science meets religion,
And nature meets nurture.
Waiting for the condescension
In tone and pats on the head
That suggests that I think too much.
I live in my head
And truth be told it can’t tell the difference
Between these “Clubs”, these institutions of belief,
Requiring my card-carrying membership for their continuation;
They are not mutually exclusive.
These systems seem extremely limited to the right or left brain,
But I do not claim to be so arrogant,
I need the whole
To satisfy both my reason and logic.
And those on both sides are pressuring me to reconcile
Who I was brought up to be and who I think I am.
I believe in one God, the father, the Almighty,
And it’s easy for me to believe in Him.
I don’t find it hard to understand that he is a loving God
Despite all worldly disasters
Because he gave us free will.
Just like I don’t find it hard to understand Schrödinger’s cat
Is simultaneously alive and dead until you open the box.
What I have a problem with
Is the idea that I supposedly shouldn’t believe
That evolution is how humans came to be
And that the story of Adam and Eve is just that,
A story,
Explaining how we’ve all come from a common ancestor.
That these thoughts separate me from God,
Damning me to an eternity in the Hell
That I don’t even think exists
Because we have forgiveness.
Our humanly existence
Is now and ever shall be,
A mystery
In which both science and religion
Are endeavors in discovering
Our infinity,
Answering the questions:
What happens when we die?
An afterlife that is the incarnation of nothingness
Is no more appealing than living forever.
What is love?
Tell me it’s more than
Oxytocin synapses firing in the brain.
What is the meaning of life?
To reproduce offspring best fit to survive,
But tell me, what is surviving?
I do, however,
Find comfort in a man who hung on a cross for me,
Whose passion was so great he died so I could live
Without ridicule,
Without sin,
Without ignorance.
I revisit his gift every Sunday,
Imbibing in
The body and blood of our lord, Jesus Christ,
I am not worthy,
It’s scary how easily these words rise to my lips
Before the Eucharist,
Since second grade these words have been bred into me:
I am not worthy to receive you but only say the word and I shall be healed.
It’s the people involved
That is the ivy strangling the roots of these associations,
Dividing faith and religion,
Science and the institution.
The parasitic relationship they’ve created in contentment
Because in the face of their enormous egos,
They’d rather not change.
You see,
I want to understand,
I want to believe in both,
I want to eat of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.
I’ll believe until my dying day,
And despite whatever’s thereafter
My faithful life will not –
Contrary to popular belief –
Have been a waste of time
In a
World without end,
Amen.
And to the son,
And to the holy spirit.
As it was in the beginning,
I believed that I belonged to an Old Boys Club.
My mind is where science meets religion,
And nature meets nurture.
Waiting for the condescension
In tone and pats on the head
That suggests that I think too much.
I live in my head
And truth be told it can’t tell the difference
Between these “Clubs”, these institutions of belief,
Requiring my card-carrying membership for their continuation;
They are not mutually exclusive.
These systems seem extremely limited to the right or left brain,
But I do not claim to be so arrogant,
I need the whole
To satisfy both my reason and logic.
And those on both sides are pressuring me to reconcile
Who I was brought up to be and who I think I am.
I believe in one God, the father, the Almighty,
And it’s easy for me to believe in Him.
I don’t find it hard to understand that he is a loving God
Despite all worldly disasters
Because he gave us free will.
Just like I don’t find it hard to understand Schrödinger’s cat
Is simultaneously alive and dead until you open the box.
What I have a problem with
Is the idea that I supposedly shouldn’t believe
That evolution is how humans came to be
And that the story of Adam and Eve is just that,
A story,
Explaining how we’ve all come from a common ancestor.
That these thoughts separate me from God,
Damning me to an eternity in the Hell
That I don’t even think exists
Because we have forgiveness.
Our humanly existence
Is now and ever shall be,
A mystery
In which both science and religion
Are endeavors in discovering
Our infinity,
Answering the questions:
What happens when we die?
An afterlife that is the incarnation of nothingness
Is no more appealing than living forever.
What is love?
Tell me it’s more than
Oxytocin synapses firing in the brain.
What is the meaning of life?
To reproduce offspring best fit to survive,
But tell me, what is surviving?
I do, however,
Find comfort in a man who hung on a cross for me,
Whose passion was so great he died so I could live
Without ridicule,
Without sin,
Without ignorance.
I revisit his gift every Sunday,
Imbibing in
The body and blood of our lord, Jesus Christ,
I am not worthy,
It’s scary how easily these words rise to my lips
Before the Eucharist,
Since second grade these words have been bred into me:
I am not worthy to receive you but only say the word and I shall be healed.
It’s the people involved
That is the ivy strangling the roots of these associations,
Dividing faith and religion,
Science and the institution.
The parasitic relationship they’ve created in contentment
Because in the face of their enormous egos,
They’d rather not change.
You see,
I want to understand,
I want to believe in both,
I want to eat of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.
I’ll believe until my dying day,
And despite whatever’s thereafter
My faithful life will not –
Contrary to popular belief –
Have been a waste of time
In a
World without end,
Amen.
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