Policar, 2004.
We celebrate the passing of an age
unequal split across two tracks of time,
a mother's and a son's, without a reason
to add them now, except to get a laugh
when we say we're a hundred. Well, it's true,
though those ignorant of our birthdays couldn't guess.
Surprising yet predictable, I guess,
is losing youthful vigor as we age.
We lose it to the gentle march of time,
while fearing the potential loss of reason.
We cover up our panic with a laugh
at jokes that aren't funny, merely true.
Simpler, perhaps, to tolerate for true
believers, who "know" what I just guess
or hope for, when listening to new age
music or reading scripture from another time.
But how am I to couple faith to reason?
The very thought of trying makes me laugh.
And my attempts just serve to make you laugh.
Of course, that doesn't mean it isn't true.
The dream of Heaven might be just a guess
at what we find beyond the grave. An age-
old game, but not an idle pass-time:
we keep those stories current for a reason.
But must we always choose 'twixt faith and reason?
Or can we bid them play together, laugh
as they run, hands tight-clasped, through true
and possible and plausible and guess,
from Dark Age-swaddled fogs through Age
of Reason, and through to the End of Time?
Perhaps we could, if we had had the time
to build ourselves a path to faith in reason
that satisfies the cynics who would laugh
as well as those who claim to know the true
nature of God and Man. Oh well, I guess
we should have started in an earlier age.
Believers may yet have reason to laugh,
for what we guess is rarely what is true,
and age-old verities decay with time.