On our knees we pray to heaven above,
As we fear the hell that’s below.
With the earth in between, to us then it seems,
That it’s here where these poles ebb and flow.
Our Father: he dwells in Heaven most high.
We his Children: hence fallen by birth.
From exile we yearn for salvation-bestowed,
As we gaze up to Heaven from Earth.
But what does it mean when that sight is beheld:
Planet Earth amidst infinite space?
Those glorious heavens we’ve seen overhead,
Aren’t different, appart-from this place.
Earth too is in Heaven, as the sun and the stars,
A space trillions of galaxies vast.
So if fallen we are, where from did we depart?
To what ground can the mind not trespass?
Where then be that Hell, or the angels and God,
If not here? And then what need to rue?
For if all Creation is the Creator himself:
In the Creation, The Creator, is You.
~r
So I really like reading your poems because they are very different from the stuff I try to write, or even a lot of the other poems I see on this site. I like the way you approach these existential ideas through themes of earth or nature and you do so in a well crafted, very organized structure; and here you’ve done it again. You might be the romantic poet in residence.
I read this poem a couple of days ago, and wanted to mull it over for a bit before responding, and I was surprised to find a new title.. I think its interesting that this is a “poem to a christian friend,” and yet in a lot of ways it seems like a personal effort to strike a balance between “eastern” and “western” thought (or at least a balance between christian and non-christian thought). I’m not sure why I find this so interesting, but I do think it is neat how changing the title between my first and second read has changed the overall feel of the poem for me, and in some ways better. I definitely get more internal struggle here than I read the first time.
But either way, nice work. Keep it up man.