Terra Purgatorio

God is in Heaven,

And Satan’s in Hell,

But I’ve seen the face of neither.

No Christian am I,

But no atheist,

So when I consider either,

My mind’s sometimes drawn

To Catholic beliefs

Of Limbo, where souls take a breather.

For what else is earth?

Who dares call this life?

What Father would bless us with pain?

We must have done wrong,

And here make amends;

From past sins must learn to refrain.

There’s nowhere so cruel,

No time so ill spent,

Unless here, in this world, we’re arraigned.

This life’s then a coin

Tossed down in a cup

Held out by impoverished souls.

A one-time reprieve;

A governor’s stay

Before being tossed to the coals.

And each day’s a test;

Jehovah’s UA

‘Fore Lord Jesus will grant our paroles.

And life’s a ‘time-out;’

A swat on our butts;

We’ve been sent to our room with no meal.

Our souls have been tried,

The sentence passed down,

Yet our Maker still cuts us a deal:

To save us through Christ,

 And spare us from Hell,

Yet this plea bargain can’t be revealed.

We’re unaware, and

Oblivious to

The fact that we get one more chance.

If not, any change

Or growth in our hearts

Is false and no grounds to advance.

If our souls transform,

It must be our choice,

And a show of our true moral stance.

And so, we each live

And stumble along,

Quite ignorant as to our pain.

And never think that

This miserable time

Filled with cancer, consumption, and strain,

Is not our first time

In corporeal form,

But result of a jealous God’s bane.

For look all around,

You’ve not seen the ache?

The agony, the anguish, the grief?

The infants with AIDS,

The homeless old men;

And most days for them there’s no relief,

But prayer and the hope

A new day will dawn

Where their suffering won’t always be chief.

But madness still reigns,

And sin still prevails,

Our President pandered for sex.

Then looked in the lens,

And lied most sincere,

His deception, a simple reflex.

While we that were duped,

Can’t muster a care

Between Prozac and government checks.

Starvation and droughts,

Earthquakes and floods,

Disasters now spanning our earth.

There’re kids toting guns,

And crack smoking whores

Selling children for twenty rocks worth.

And who can you blame?

The addicts? The poor?

Their dads were in jail at their birth!

Planes have been hijacked,

And buildings are bombed

For race or beliefs of all kinds.

Serial killers

Are stalking the streets

With their warped and dysfunctional minds.

And those who seek help

Can turn on the tube

For a reverend with ‘Send Money’ signs.

If that’s not enough

And you still need a fix

For how sick our society grows...

Switch the remote

For lesbian fights

On the top-rated Springer talk shows.

So smile, take your fill,

It’s all that we have

‘Til our life here draws down to a close.

Now why your strange look;

Your questioning eyes,

Did I not paint the picture so well?

You still disbelieve?

Perhaps I do too,

On some topics no one can tell.

Suffice it to say,

If these thoughts are wrong,

Then, perhaps we’re already in Hell.