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A Reason

A Reason

 

A ponderous existence is our enigma in life

to experience the fullness of all is perplexity

Highly subjective we are intensely observant

the world is seen as a cinema screen

A performance in which we all take part

a drama of strange participation

 

Do I serve a purpose through my being here

is my individuality purposefully made

Am I a cog in a wheel of permanent social contact

is everything real or some inconceivable illusion

Am I required to be productive and if so what

or am I wandering aimlessly through a maze

 

Is there some grand culmination where all will be revealed

or are we the unintended victims of some random act of nature

When we take our last breath and say farewell

do we enter a black void of nothingness

Will our demise be of any consequence

a simple final end after moments which are valueless

 

Perhaps life here and now is a prelude

to an awakening into a new reality

Am I to be re acquainted with those I have known before

in some joyful reunion of well done

Will an orchestra reach a glorious crescendo

to reveal who I am and why I have been

or who I was

◄ One of Many

A Collage of Autumn ►

Comments

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jennifer Malden

Tue 29th Oct 2019 19:56

Great poem. How many questions which we have been asking ourselves for centuries. The last verse reveals a hope of something afterwards. A lot to think about.

Jennifer

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Don Matthews

Mon 14th Oct 2019 07:56

Ian

I'm coming in cold here. You saying

'Apparently we're sinful by nature'

suggests we are born sinful. What's going on here?.....

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Don Matthews

Sun 13th Oct 2019 12:39

We need a few catastrophies
To cull us out a bit
We're overpopulated
The world has gone to shit

Procreation's gone mad
No limits on childbirth
Have as many as you like
I hear a cry? ....Our earth

Can only keep a certain lot
But you just thumb your nose
And procreate for all your worth
(I'm used to rhyme, not prose.....)

Who cares about overpopulation?......

<Deleted User> (18980)

Sun 13th Oct 2019 12:30

Yes Mark - too much procreation, no predators, control of diseases. We're digging our own graves.

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M.C. Newberry

Sun 13th Oct 2019 12:11

Interestingly, if procreation is why we're here (Brian), then there's
irony indeed in the knowledge that the human race is busy f......g
itself into the oblivion of unsustainability!

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Don Matthews

Sun 13th Oct 2019 11:39

Brian has just gone buggered up
My maiden lovelies hope
And basking in the heavenly light
Of this I could well cope

He says I'll just be fodder
For some juicy worm
How cruel to kill off all my hopes
Before I reach my term

BUT

A great admission follows
He said he could be wrong
Which does indeed surprise me
With views that are so strong ?


<Deleted User> (18980)

Sun 13th Oct 2019 11:15

Before mankind became sophisticated like wot we are today there was only one reason for our existence...procreation, and that is still the only reason.

And the only certain thing in life is death at the end of it, at which point we rot away eventually into the soil. Sorry to all those expecting more...you've got a big disappointment to look forward to I'm afraid.

On the other hand I could be wrong...

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Don Matthews

Sun 13th Oct 2019 11:06

Having been there and checked our the drink situation Keith I am now on 'buddy' terms with the bar-runners.. I shall put in a request you be catered for. I can assure you plenty of spirits, and the diaphanous lovelies are not fussy.....?

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keith jeffries

Sun 13th Oct 2019 09:23

Ray and Don,

Thank you for your additional comments. I wrote the poem from a perspective representing what most of us face, which is unknowing what, if anything, lies beyond the grave and the enigma of there being any purpose to life. I understand Ray´s "reasons for living" which from my point of view, is that hope nearly always springs (eternal in the human breast) forth to propel our momentum through life. As one who subscribes to a belief system I hope for an eternal life, but what form it takes I have no idea. I am called to be honest and say that I don´t know whether there exists another dimension awaiting us when we die but through faith, I hope for one. Believer or not, we shall discover the reality in the fullness of time.

If there is life after death we may well meet each other for the first time in person and possibly also diaphonous angelic maidens in a cool bar, athough my preference would be for a gay bar. We are destined to wait and see.
Thank you both again

Keith

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Don Matthews

Sat 12th Oct 2019 23:02

Hey folks I'm back to tell you
What's on the other side

(We wait with bated breath Don....)

You must be quiet and promise
Me not to deride

(No way mate....)

You better bring your dancing shoes
Cos lotsa angels there
Shimmying round in diaphanous gowns
(No Keith, not quite bare....)

They have a real cool bar there
Spirits of all kind
It's like a great big treasure hunt
Surprising what you'll find

(You don't believe a word of me do you?....oh ye of little faith... Thalia is shaking her head.....no, she's giggling....stop it girl......you'll destroy my shining image in front of my fellow poets.....)

(He does go on....) ?

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raypool

Sat 12th Oct 2019 21:47

Your whole poem is a cry from the heart Keith. A sad one really, in view of the impossibility of its being truly answered, though many would claim their own beliefs as valid. We all need reasons to continue, but the exhilaration of life itself serves me and the adventure of it, with its cross winds and challenges. I'm not sure if you have any answers and maybe the poem is just to test other's resolve. I don't know, as writing can be pure imagination. Knowing how conscientious you are I think you may enlighten me!

All the best, Ray

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keith jeffries

Sat 12th Oct 2019 21:37

Don and Kevin,

Thank you for responding to this poem which poses the problems of a purpose for life, if there is one and what, if anything, lies beyond this existence. Don says he is not religious but thinks it logical that there must be some outcome to life. Kevin, would be happy to travel down the tunnel of darkness to rest and into nothingness. Yet some including myself sense a feeling of anticipation in death but find it difficult to articulate. Eternity is a strange word. No one has returned from the grave to illuminate our knowledge so we are all left in the dark. I feel that we shall be forever haunted by this enigma and only our personal experience of death will determine an answer.

Thank you again.
Keith


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Don Matthews

Sat 12th Oct 2019 10:02

Oblivion, oblivion
Look forward I to thee
Please swallow me into your black
I plead, on bended knee

Oblivion here, you bended one
Have you passed my test?
You needs be knackered, buggered up
Incapable of rest

Oblivion I assure you
WOL's sapped my inner core
I'm knackered, fully buggered up
And can do no more

(Come in Don.....)

(Gosh it's black in here?...)

(We specialize in doom and gloom....)

(Help! let me outa here......)

Nod to kJ ?

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kJ Walker

Sat 12th Oct 2019 08:23

Hi Keith
Having read this, I started pondering my own reason for existence.
I believe (and hope) that at the end of it all we do "enter a black hole of nothingness".
After my time has finished on this earth, I'll be too knackered for anything else but oblivion.
Cheers Kevin

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Don Matthews

Sat 12th Oct 2019 00:01

I am not religious Keith, but to me, to spend all this time here in vain and be nothing at the end does not make sense. Logic says there's got to be something following. What I don't know. Perhaps a recycling of souls into new babies? But as someone said there wouldn't be enough babies to go around, to which I replied He could just create some more. Sorted.

Guess this explains population explosion. Logical......?

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