GIAB - New Poem

god is a beast is a statement about society more than it is about god.

As we go forth and multiply, subdue the Earth and our neighbours in pursuit of pleasing various gods and appetites, we've developed great power and cunning.
We've reshaped our environment, we've pushed past the atmospheric envelope and pierced the ozone layer.

We've landed on the moon and set up shop on Mars. We're drilling into the ancient hides of asteroids arriving from the beginnings of time. We've begun to walk the stars!

Oppenheimer quoted the lines of the Bhagavad Gita "I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds." When he unleashed the first atomic blasts on this planet.

Who else but god's have such power? To make and unmake? To wield such sway over the fates of billions, trillions countless lives on this planet?

I wanted to show how powerful the human being is. Containing millions of seeds of the Powers to Be. It's poetic, but true. A man's ejaculate contains millions of sperm. A woman's ovary is like a thousand petalled moon flower releasing matured seeds monthly over her lifetime reserve. Our minds bring us flashes of brilliance, inspired genius, glimpses of the impossible. Our wills make the impossible possible. The Wrights, Alexander Graham Bell, Einstein. Rosa parks.

With all this potential, we could forge something wonderful across the galaxies. We could be the cultivators of culture, life and love. We could heal this planet in a hundred or so years, we could feed the hungry, attend the ill.

I suspect, as long as we keep looking to the Heavens to save us we'll over look the most immediate source of solutions. Our own bright minds, warm hearts and our two sets of five fingers.

And that's what this poem is about, in a blasphemous, metaphoric kinda way.

I came across a contest at AP for a Blasphemous Metaphor. I chose to do one because of three things.

First, the call to do so made me uncomfortable. Scared actually, and I am all about facing what scares me.

Second, I realized some time ago while journaling that If I lived in another place, or in another time, I could be burned at the stake for my somewhat mystical experiences and sometimes heretical views. With this in mind, I felt it a fitting activity to explore the freedoms of my place and time in the world to produce what could only exist, in this place and time.

In doing so, I felt I was honouring the Veteran's that made sure I could say, think and write what is in me to express. People like my four grand parents and my father. Also, those other's who I never met, or even heard of. For those whove never been found.

And Thirdly, I already had the three core lines of the poem running through my head over the past few days. I figured the convergence of Time (Nov.11) and opportunity (the contest) and inspiration (3 persistent lines of prose) was fitting enough a reason to take the time to compose a poem with a blasphemous tone. After all, the majority of wars across this globe and through history, have been in the name of gods, and what's more blasphemous than that?