A shorter list now than when I was younger:
No one is more worship-obsessed than the child
Who is told that there are no secrets,
And that all things--including him, and Him--are either good or evil,
And who will think of God even when in the company of others.
Now, it’s only those times when I wonder if the empty-feeling
Of sleepless nights--that black-pitted worry--
Is where God would fit, or if God is that emptiness,
The way that some people believe God is the in-between,
The gaps, the dark matter, the not at the edge of what is,
Like the line just the width of a spider’s thread that separates
The muddy-purple mountain from the sky at dusk.
To look at those mountains in early autumn,
The snow already gathering at the peak,
Avalanching down into a blur of yellows and oranges--
A precursor of what will tumble to the valley soon--
He’s the last thing on my mind;
He can exist, or He can go on not existing
For all I care. Who can worship a deity so redundant?
After all, what could be more generous than this,
Whose grace greater than the mountain that prolongs the morning,
Drags out the evening,
Those times when the day is at its finest?
Who else could put from our mind that death will come,
For which a possible heaven is no consolation,
Especially when it’s unclear
If a cloud can carry the weight of a mountain,
Or if there are autumns there in that perfect climate?
"Those Times I've Taken God Seriously" first appeared in Amethyst Review
Goddfrey Hammit. 