Gnomic Verses by William Blake

To God

ii
If you have form'd a circle to go into,
Go into it yourself, and see how you would do.

iii
They said this mystery never shall cease:
The priest promotes war, and the soldier peace.

Dying leaves drift yet melancholy lifts
with the sun’s warming of the morning chill;
to perceive evil where it exists gifts
me with optimism* while grieving still:
Recognizing wrongs in no limits rules,
no less grotesque than the foes’ heinous way;
there's art of war games; there's the war crime school’s
whose masks are mirrors of the hates they slay.
The life we love, the death wish ever thus
stalks us for another day – the wiser,
(some of us), such righteous paths disgusts;
who trusts the Good trumps same old divisors.
Moral myopia karma’s war's tears:
Shredding His children, all summons God's prayers.



© Helga Ross 2004, 2006

* "I am not a pessimist; to perceive evil where it exists is,
in my opinion, a form of optimism."
- Roberto Rossellini