Really Very Serious Stuff

Where Does God Live?

I Think I know Where God Lives

Omipotence Is Ours

Omniscience

Continua - Between Two Poles on a Globe

The Curse of Global Warming

Men in Masks - Men in Flags - Men in Words

Schrodinger’s Cat

REALLY VERY SERIOUS STUFF

It is really absurd
How a three letter word
Made from G-O-D raises alarms.
For all sorts of folk
Who don’t see a joke
In a beast with four legs and no arms.

You must feed it each day
So it knows the right way
To protect you so you’ll never fail.
Hold the lead round its head
And you’ll safely be led
If it’s not being wagged by its tail.

Philosophers cry
You must never rely
On perceptions of truth, two a penny.
Instead it is wise
Not to search for one prize
But to comfort yourself in the many.

That’s why this absurd
Little three letter word
Has provided good meat for enquiry.
I’m happy to go
Where it takes me and so
I’ll write it all down in my diary.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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WHERE DOES GOD LIVE?

I want to know where God lives but I can’t
be satisfied with answers that my aunt
in years gone by, in letters I’ll be bound,
described how he is housed above the ground.

Above the trees and higher than the sky
in stratosphere where puffy clouds float by.
Where all good people go to when they die
to sit at his right hand.  I wonder why?

It seems to me that when you die you’re dead
and dead you stay while maggots softly tread
across your tasty parts to gnaw and crawl
till there is nothing left of you at all.

I’ve seen chooks with their tiny heads chopped off.
They kick their legs and give a little cough
from out their necks along with pints of blood,
then go quite still, resigned from daily plod.

Like chooks we spend each day just pecking round,
doing things and making clucking sound,
not often contemplating higher matter,
preferring to engage in idle chatter.

Finding God's home is a complex search.
We could agree it's hiding in the church,
'cos then in resignation we could rest
accommodating worms inside our chest.

But that's no resolution of my quest.
My grail undiscovered turns to pest.
I want to know where God lives and it’s plain
I’ll have to wait until I write again.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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I THINK I KNOW WHERE GOD LIVES

I’ve been thinking and I've come to some conclusions.
They don’t all gel and consequent confusions
promote a quandary of quite large proportions
that cause my brain to activate contortions.

I said next time I write I might discover
the place where God lives, yet another
thing that drives me silly faster
is that omnipresence is so hard to master.

How is it, I conjecture, things can be
in other spots while still being here with me?
Instantly I think God has to share
my place, I know he's over there.

I think perhaps I’m wrong to bark up birch
when God seems to me like I saw in church,
an old man with a halo round his head.
Perhaps I’ll bark up willow trees instead.

If God was nothing like a man but bigger
then he could survey many things and figure
how to reach and touch all in one hour
displaying omnipresence as his power.

More likely though if God is comprehension,
a concept of the mind without dimension,
or shape or weight or colour priming senses,
then omnipresence needs no feigned defences.

Wherever minds exist the concept hovers,
available to everyone who bothers
to find out if there’s more to me than self
in yet unopened treasures on the shelf.

I think I’ve found where God lives.  It’s in me,
and in each other human.  All could see
it's in a hint of order without doubt,
and it’s up to us to search and dig it out.

It’s likely then that heaven isn’t far.
To get there I won’t ride upon a star.
The God bit in me will decide to rise
To go to better places in the skies.

The me bit will lie down and feed the worms,
and awkwardly pen posthumousy poems.
Some people say I’ll always keep on wishing
that my boat comes with me, then I’ll go out fishing.

But now another question leaves me haunted.
If God is all the power I feel daunted.
Does “omni-potent” leave me weak and hollow?
I’ll have to wait till writing time tomorrow.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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OMNIPOTENCE

The question, if the essence of all power
is monopolised by one who’s sweet not sour,
becomes “How is it that we suffer sad
from disaster, crime, disease and all that’s bad?”

Surely God the Power could generate
a world that’s full of love, excluding hate
where everyone could feel free, healthy, strong
and delight in coexistence all life long.

Such never seems included in the sight
that’s shown to me on telly every night.
Instead I see a constant flood of woe,
where seemingly God's Power ceased to flow.

But then I tell myself to think back fast
to where I got to in my poem last.
For there I know for certain that I am right
And the answer to my question is in sight.

I said…

"I think I’ve found where God lives.  It’s in me,
and in each other human.  All could see
it's in a hint of order without doubt,
and it’s up to us to search and dig it out."

Well…

With that in mind it’s really not too hard
to anticipate the next step by a yard.
What’s needed is a contemplative hour
where thinking folk perceive a sense power.

It’s in a special package bravely given
called free will.  We use it as we’re driven
by force of nature or by higher cause,
to rushed response, or to a wiser pause.

If pause we take then maybe in that hour
we’ll view the hint of order in our power
and chaos can be slid aside a-while,
our judgements bringing good, not something vile.

If God is omni-potent then it’s true
the omni-potence shared by me and you
is how the good it brings is best enacted
for used by one the good is oft’ contracted.

The sense of order that I visualise
and strive for every morning as I rise
will bring a kind of peace that’s only found
when people search together on their ground.

If everyone existing, and those past,
and those to come could know the order vast
the question of God’s omni-potent thread
would not be asked, but exercised instead.

That thread it is for us to take and use
deciding good not evil when we choose
new ways to search for order in our time.
And there I’ll end this reverential rhyme.

But wait there’s more I hear my conscience cry.
I feel a splinter sticking in my eye.
"Omnisience" it is I’ve just found out.
It can’t be.  Yes it is. Another doubt!

Another day I’ll try to win the prize
for knowing what it takes to make men wise.
But now I need a slightly different diet
of a little intellectual peace and quiet.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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OMNISCIENCE

All knowledge is a really funny question.
Thinking on it gives me indigestion.
There are problematic issues for the sleuth
lying dormant till he closes in on truth.

Awakened they promote new apprehension,
where knowledge held requires fast extension,
towards each new reality revealed.
The sleuth must search until the onion’s peeled.

It’s true that every truth has always been
forever hidden, shrouded by a screen
of ignorance we carry from our birth
throughout our finite time upon this earth.

New lands, the planets, cord blood, DNA
have been in place forever and a day.
Then slowly out of darkness thinkers glide,
advancing past the blindness screens provide.

And as one screen is newly moved aside,
another is discovered to divide
the sleuth from further layers of new facts
that compromise the truth of current acts.

All knowledge then it seems is out of reach
by one, but what if many I beseech
combined all knowledge held in archived piles
or one encyclopaedic set of files

This product new would overflow I’d bet
then someone would invent the Internet.
“But wait” I heard a cyber-guru say,
“My goodness, yes, we did that yesterday”.

Perhaps my task is knowing every day
tomorrow’s news before it’s had its way
in shaping fresh events met by our sleuth
that forge his comprehension of the truth.

More likely though the answer lies in knowing
just where we are and where we hope we're going.
That way the screens that block our view today
will help protect us as we find our way.

What we can’t know now is never ending.
We need to hone our future skills in blending
our past and present when tomorrow comes
so we're not caught just sitting on our thumbs.

So long as we ’ve the courage to apply
creative thinking, that will get us by.
Instead of needing knowledge it is fair
to say we need to think beyond the square.

Knowing is dynamic willful power,
managing new matter hour by hour.
It’s learning to connect the dots much faster
through knowing how to know we need to master.

With this in mind perhaps I should return
to earlier rhymes wherein I hoped to learn
of place and power and the role I play
in giving shape to my life day by day.

I said…

"I think I’ve found where God lives.  It’s in me,
and in each other human.  All could see
it's in a hint of order without doubt,
and it’s up to us to search and dig it out."

Well…

The order I find needing my attention
is universal, and it’s my contention
that acting without knowledge of it matters,
reducing acts to consequential tatters.

Knowing it and how it tends to flow
provides a firm foundation as I grow
towards a fuller knowledge of my being
and my becoming, that’s now what I’m seeing.

My final discourse on these heady themes
will surely come from future restless dreams
of where God lives, and of the parts I play.
For now I’ll stop to write another day.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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CONTINUA - between two poles on a globe

The force of all things
co-exists with its opposite force
in paired hemispheres.
Each extreme is therefore
half only of the whole.

This pairing nurtures mutual support
between opposing forces as the presence of each
contributes necessarily to the
essence of the other.

Paired forces are thus in a state of
natural and harmonic contradiction.

They create their own symmetry.

So...
life and death, or
sound and silence
are each half of the same whole.

Knowledge of opposing
and contradictory elements
of the same whole
is not gained only through sensory experience.

Psychic apprehension of qualities
inherent in two contradicting elements
can be gained through
critical appreciation
of the sensory experience of either one
and the relationship between that
and its absolute negation.

One does not necessarily
need to experience
death in order to know life, or
sound to know silence.

One merely needs to understand
and to employ a process of
totally denying what is.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2005
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THE CURSE OF GLOBAL WARMING

Sulphur crested cockatoos,
majestic birds in flight,
scare the daylights out of me
by screeching late at night.

It’s global warming, yes indeed,
that makes them squark so shrill.
Contaminated sunflower seed
has strengthened avian will.

Projections say they’ll grow quite large,
wing tips ten feet between,
with rock-hard beaks, tight-hooked to gorge
on human heart and spleen.

Grey scaly feet all pidgeon toed
hold on while cocky dances,
but changes we’ll see down the road
show frightening advances.

It’s talons then will grip and choke
a sheep or calf in each,
or teacher, doctor, country folk,
then shred them while both screech

They’re destined soon to rule us all
through parliament I see.
Then law will be the next to fall.
They’ll make their own decree.

Armed forces next and police last,
no call is too absurd.
Ambitions raging, nothing’s past,
this fast evolving bird.

Be cautious what you think and do,
don’t enter conversation
that puts down any cockatoo
or denegrates it's station.

Do everything within your reach
to stop the white flock swarming.
At night when birds begin to screech,
remember global warming.

We’ve much to fear from carelessness.
Our future needs protection.
Stay wise and silent through this mess.
Give sunflowers full attention.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2007
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Men in Masks

Each night on a news, whichever I choose,
I learn of most frightening tasks,
Carried out in the name of some crazy old game,
Called religion by big men in masks.

Electing to hide their visages inside
Their socks they defy recognition.
“Come on out! Show your face! What religion, what race
Are you acting for this week, chameleon?”

Pretending at terror there’s little inside a
Black sock with some crude ventilation,
But a pea for a brain that can never contain
Any thought outside world domination.

They almost appear the same from the rear
As they do from the front ‘cept for noses,
And eyes that peek out, and mouth holes that spout
Angry threats, launched from angrier poses.

Old men and young too, as motley crew,
Join these rattletrap bands and their trainers,
Hiding faces in cloth, never taking it off
To clean teeth or to cough, they’re no-brainers.

When intentions are good you don’t need a hood
As protection from being discovered.
It’s the Vandals and Goths of today who wear cloths,
Faces hidden, identity smothered.

Some night on a news if I’m lucky I’ll choose
A tale of some praiseworthy tasks,
Carried out by a team of proud people who dream
Of a life where men never wear masks.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2007
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Men in Flags

Each night on a news, whichever I choose,
I see men in wild conversation
In fury debating, some crying, some hating
Men in flags of a differing nation.

There are those who will brag, while wrapped in the flag
Of their birth-place, (god-given location),
Shouting insults galore towards others who wear
Different colours. A foul demonstration.

Self-anointed “the best”, streets ahead of the rest,
Brass patriots model their station,
Creating a crest they can wear on their chest,
Then beat madly in stern indignation.

A desire for fame motivates them to claim
Higher order is theirs, as the taker.
For superior place and religion and race
Were divinely decreed by their maker.

But there has to be space in the world for the face
Of people with varied persuasions
From ideals one holds near. They will rarely appear
To share common-ground generalisations.

Men in flags being brave would do better to wave
Global colours for human survival,
Laying difference aside we could say with some pride
“With one banner we don’t have a rival.”

Some night on a news if I’m lucky I’ll choose
A tale of some honoured behaviour,
Carried out by a team of proud people who dream
That we each are another man’s saviour.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2007
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Men in Words

Each night on a news, whichever I choose,
Men proclaim through their loud oratory
That giving or taking or changing or making
Is their role, since they wrote the story.

“This country will grow.” “That child won’t know.”
“Grain prices will fall the world over.”
“We’ll build a dam here; fight two wars next year.
God willing we’ll all be in clover.”

They tell us they’re wise, and then promise a prize.
“No wait for a hospital bed.”
“The ice-caps won't melt, but if sea levels rise”
We'll desalinate water instead.”

“Stop harvesting fruit, be a brain not a brute,
Ideas are called for today.”
“Design something new, employ a small crew.
Export your best, do not delay.”

“The dollar is high, inflation is low,
The GDP couldn’t be stronger.”
“Doesn’t matter if petrol increases in price,
We’ll walk. The route never gets longer.”

“We’ll plan and decide each way you should ride
Since we see what’s good for the many.”
“Coalitions of willing are bought for a shilling,
Being cheap they won’t cost you a penny.”

Some night on a news, if I’m lucky I’ll choose
A plain story that’s honestly given,
Described by a team of proud people who dream
Of ideas altruistically driven.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2007
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Schrodinger’s Cat

Inside the box we have Schrodinger’s cat.
The state of its being is clear.
Both dead and alive it is and that’s that
With talents we all ought to fear.

Now Schrodinger’s cat exists beyond time,
A suspended mathematic dilemma.
Unrestricted by place and with power sublime,
All natural – no inbuilt antenna.

The box is no prison for Schrodinger’s pet
Since the cat doesn’t know it can’t go.
It’s multiple states puzzle many and yet
In not knowing there’s nothing to know.

On self-mewed command it can exit the box
Then get right back in when it chooses.
It passes clean through the walls, lid and locks
Yet suffers no scratches or bruises.

Like honey it flows smooth and silent between
Simultaneously under and in.
Of course when it’s out it cannot be seen
And to look in the box is a sin.

It will be in the box and be out of it too.
There’s no way to know that it’s not
Or is for that matter. What hullabaloo
This cat has caused. What equals what?

It’s Schrodinger’s cat that is everywhere now
Yet nowhere but inside one cell.
At once dead and alive it’s secret is how
To have hope while in full view of hell.

Copyright © Graham Pettigrove 2007
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