Religon?

Sighing sweetly I heard the question so often asked of me,

But this time it was with the curiosity needed to inspire my answer.

Without religion, how can one be spiritual?

I have studied the Buddhists with their fear of temptations, I have read the sacred books of the Jews as they saw only themselves, I have listened to the Christians as they chose what to ignore in their teachings. I have read, as each disdained the physical, and spoke only of pain.

Why do they fear? That the flesh may have some good in it? Assumptions abound that this veil is nothing but tears, pain & suffering, and the only way to live is the complete rejection of the only truths truly known.

I dream of soul, but I can touch the soil. I dream of cosmos, but it is my eyes that see others. I am deceived by thought, but I can hear you speak.

I reject the worship of pain that has driven many,

instead I replace it with the child’s smile, the birds song, the touch of a lover. For I will not reject what I have been given, what I have received.

Instead I embrace that which I cannot understand, and I smile in the face of time. Perhaps only briefly, hidden in life.

Sometimes in pain, sometimes in pleasure.

I do not know the nature of the Cosmos, I only guess, and listen to the conjectures of others and I except, question & doubt.

This is at the heart of this 'Taoist Absurdist.'

This is the heart of the Seeker, the sinner, the child, & the weeper. I do not know. And this shall never an excuse for fear be,

but a chance to hear, what has not been heard before.

I have seen swallows greater then men,

I have heard humor, more powerful than law.

I have seen beauty that outweighed all.

In this, the only surety I find is that truly it will end. Perhaps they are right, the ending only begets a beginning, and if such is true,

I cannot wait till I know that too.

But for now, I know the cold dawn, the dirty street, the crying child, the violence of angry souls. Even in these there is hope. I may seek a warm day, I can clean myself anyway, I can hug the child, and I can resist anger, and defend my heart. I can succeed and I can fail, and I can fall somewhere in between.

And I can accept the world as it is, whatever that is.