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PrinceMyshkin
06-09-2010, 07:27 AM
Who could measure the depth
of their disagreement
or of their love for each other?

“The trouble with you,”
one had been saying over and over
for ‘God’ knew how many years,
“is that you can’t see that ‘soul’
etcetera are just metaphors.”

To which the other had long ago
and often replied, “The trouble with you
is that you cannot see!”

But each rejoiced in the other’s
momentary, mortal triumph
over him. Each victory
(temporary, of course) was chalked up
to their friendship.

The one worshipped
the blatant evidence of God’s goodness
in the other; the other thought
that to love his friend was enough:

his gullibility, his childlike desire
to fit every square peg in a waiting
round hole. God, if I may presume,
never offered to settle the quarrel between them
(if quarrel it was).

Hawkman
06-09-2010, 08:10 AM
Another gently thought provoking philosophical parable, my Prince. You would seem to have a vocation as a humanist, (agnostic?) rabbi. With the lightest of touches you display for us alternate aspects of faith.

Live and be well - H

krymsonkyng
06-09-2010, 09:21 AM
This is my roommate and I. Thank you for a pleasant and relate-able work of art.

PrinceMyshkin
06-10-2010, 07:47 AM
Thanks, Hawkman & Krymsonkyng.

lallison
06-10-2010, 08:18 AM
been thinking a lot about religion these days, eh PM. I really enjoyed reading the congenial, if perhaps simplified, relationship you represent between the two that you dramatize here. It emphasizes that hearts are what makes friends, not beliefs, and in the end, the importance of secularism and tolerance. Your ideas are always artfully conveyed in interesting poems. Another nice one.

PrinceMyshkin
06-11-2010, 12:40 PM
been thinking a lot about religion these days, eh PM. I really enjoyed reading the congenial, if perhaps simplified, relationship you represent between the two that you dramatize here. It emphasizes that hearts are what makes friends, not beliefs, and in the end, the importance of secularism and tolerance. Your ideas are always artfully conveyed in interesting poems. Another nice one.

When it comes to religion, I stand with Julian Barnes: “I don't believe in God, but I miss him."