Despite - or maybe because of - my Methodist upbringing, I've grown up an atheist; more accurately a Humanist with Buddhist tendencies and a Tangerine affiliation. I start from the premise that everything that lives is holy [except wasps, naturally] but I'm very conscious from time to time just how thin our veneer of civilisation is. Voltaire famously said "if God didn't exist it would be necessary to invent him" [except, of course, he said it in French]; all part of the collective superego that we've evolved to protect our species.
Yet if we step back and take an anthropological perspective, it's worrying that we make serious business of killing each other in the name of our various Gods - Yehovah, Allah, Ahura Mazda, Jesus, the Para Bramh. The tenets of our most revered religions get twisted to justify ethnic cleansing and abhorrent sociopathies. The killer instinct is deep-rooted in our psyches. That's a sobering thought.
Today's poem is an irreverent parody of the Judaeo-Christian creation myth. It's not newly minted, as I just haven't had time this week. It's something I've dragged up from my youthful back pages when I was speculating about what might happen if the Great Originator began to malfunction, or just got very bored with always creating, creating, creating. The idea for it was sparked by watching a Morecambe & Wise comedy skit in which they were replaying a battle [Waterloo?] with toy soldiers - only one of them introduced tanks to give his troops an edge, the other responded with planes and soon they were heading for Mutually Assured Destruction with a proliferation of ever more sophisticated intercontinental nuclear missiles - very funny but with a deadly moral message.
The Seven Days Of Destruction
On the first day
God created sticks and stones
and watched with glee
as men broke up each other's bones;
and seeing it was such good fun
He said "I'll let the fight go on."
On the second day
He created spears and knives
and guffawed aloud
as men despoiled each other's lives.
Then, very pleased with what He'd done
He said "I'll let the fight go on."
On the third day
God created pikes and bows
and jumped for joy
as armies fell in bloody rows;
so, highly chuffed with Number One
He said "I'll let the fight go on."
On the fourth day
Himself bestowed on men the gun
and split his sides
as soldiers lost and bullets won.
Though powder-smoke obscured His fun
He said "I'll let the fight go on."
On the fifth day
the Great One sent down tanks and planes
and pissed His pants
as half of Europe spilled its brains.
Beside Himself with what He'd done
He said "I'll let the fight go on."
On the sixth day
He gave each nation nuclear kits
and had hysterics
watching Earth explode to bits.
Insanely pleased with Number One
He said "That show should be re-run."
On the seventh day
the Great Destroyer took a nap,
but when He woke
He scanned His universal map,
picked the next victims of His fun
and said "Good, let the fight go on."
Thank you for reading. Love one another, we're all we've got. S :-)
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