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Previous poem - A worried man
ON NOTICING SOMETHING THAT SEEMS TO BE MISSING FROM KAREN ARMSTRONG'S BOOK 'THE CASE FOR GOD'
The theme here
in this lovely place
- though some pretend
not to have noticed it -
is death - oh yes,
expressed in terms of life but nonetheless
the Church says it is
'out of this world'
and what is that supposed to mean if it isn't
death? Here
in this lovely place
we walk into death as
into a womb (the rhyme
is too obvious -
but that is what it is). Yes
we are talking about
Life and Resurrection, but
first - death,
and Life and resurrection are not a device for not
noticing it. Here
in the company of the Saints who are
the personification of death
we die and alas I
(at this stage of the game at least)
would consider it presumptuous to say
'to live again'.
For first we have to know
the finality of that closing down
of eyes, of ears, of tongue, of nose,
prior to knowing that
loveliness
that is not of this world.