And Still What? (Vixen's Den)

(Having thought over an uncomfortable conversation)


Worrying over it is pointless,

Hating it, stupid,

Violence is sheer impossibility;

There is only awe,

Understanding, then love.


It isn't God's fault.

Did you believe when you first hated,

Or see him in the gun sights

When you learned life was not fair?

And why do you feel there is no justice,

When every man Jack dies?


Perhaps it was those fairy tales

They tell the sleepy mind-

But I was never lulled with lies.

No one taught me this-

As sure as blood runs through my veins,

My blood is my own.

So long as I hunger, the hunger is my own.

So long as I breathe, my fate is my own,

And my blame is my own.


There is nothing not in these hands,

And I see it as a gift,

That there is no father that betrays,

Nor mother that can't love,

Nor son to leave in your old age,

Nor daughter that sleeps in the street.


Wisdom is none of those.

When were you mislead?

We live our lives, and suffer-

If we choose. Not others.

And what of other's burdens?

You can not know their weight,

Nor measure justice by their scale,

Or measure mercy by God's.

You can only know they suffer,

And like you, they die.

Men may wrestle with angels,

But all men lose to time.


And hopefully unfold fists

Curled like baby fingers

And spread them out in awe,

Understanding, then love.



But most don't. No, they clench their fists

Right to the grave,

Holding nothing in them,

Not even love.

And of those that live,

Most are scarred, even by being born.

We all have seen the horrors,

Or worse, the blandness,

And all have seen injustice

Of man against man-

The struggle of the mediocre

Against the pathetic,

The striving and loss.

The waste.


To be morally outraged is to guess

There is some place for being moral.

Perhaps.

But that alone won't save a soul.

You can be whatever you like.

The world was made by doing.


We could beat this ass all day

And never hear it speak.

I see the imperfection of the world

But can't contain my hope

That there is still nobility,

Warmth and possibility.

I can not show it-I failed.

There is no justification-

Only awe, understanding,

Then love.


The ways of God to man?

Hell, explain yourself to me.