Three Religious Poems

Hurdles
((a Thought on religions within Jerusalem) (poetic prose))



If we’re all right and nobody is wrong something’s wrong with everybody—with that kind of thinking—, and if not, then we’re all in denial, because everybody cannot be right creating hurdles for everybody else, especially for those they think are wrong, and most likely everybody isn’t wrong—completely wrong, without a little being a little right, yet these hurdles are being created, hurdles for everybody, even Christians among Christians, and Muslims among Muslims, at the same time—perhaps the biggest sin is in creating these hurdles for each other…when we should be working on being a brother—consequently, with this kind of stinking thinking, we’re all going to hell in a bread basket!

The Jew says “We’re the chosen, how can we be wrong?” It’s not a question, even though it sounds like one. And the Catholic says, “We’re Christian, we got Peter’s hand pointed approval from the Messiah, How can we be wrong?” And the Arab, the Muslim points to Abraham, and Mohammed, says: “We got the Koran through the Archangel Gabriel who came down and gave us a command: to evangelize the world, at any cost.”

So who is right and who is wrong? And who is creating the hurdles and making the bombs?

Note: 2769 (8-3-2010)


Haikus for Qumran


de Qumran and the caves
—resides in the desert
in the Jordan Valley—


Here, the Dead Sea Scrolls
were found—bound
—a biblical treasure
discovered in ‘47…


There I stood in the afternoon sun
leaning on a grey fence
likened to a cobweb

I wanted to jump over the fence
(feeling like a two-legged kangaroo
rubbing one back leg)


Yep, it was the Essenes’ time
The ancient Jewish sect
Who had copied the old manuscripts…

Found in the desert cliffs


I sang
looking at the settlement
on the dry plateau, near the Dead Sea

and into the caves…

Yep, what a day!




Notes: The Qumran (Hebrew) the settlement, and the caves, located on the West Bank (Israel), the settlement was constructed about 150 BC, and dismantled about 68 AD, a Jewish sect called the Essenes, who traditionally wrote the manuscripts called the Dead Sea Scrolls. On my visit to Israel, I visited the museum that held the actual scrolls—saw them on display, and then to the Qumran, and its caves. The Scrolls consist of three parts: Apocryphal or Pseudepigraphical (Enoch, Jubilees, etc), and Sectarian (the greater Judaism), and the War Scroll Pesher (Hebrew Pesher—which equals: “Commentary” on Habakkuk and the Rule of the Blessing). Between 1947 and 1956, 900-scrolls were found.

Note: 2767 (8-3-2010) Written in Lima, Peru

These Haikus are of course not traditional, more my style “The Siluk Haikus,” simple because the traditional are too confining.


A Poet’s Love


In the mist of life something led you to be my wife
(late in life, aging as we were)
Thus, you were chosen to walk through ice and fire
with me, not knowing where next we’d be
You didn’t know where you were going—dancing
all the way
You seen that your life goes with me—even if it meant
leaving your home country
and that behind
was: God, death and eternal resurrection…
And in the process you wore out your shoes, several
sets of them (especially on this most recent pilgrimage)
but you grew on the way, through thorn and lilac
bushes, and at times, calm seas;
Always kissing me along the way: always ready to be
what you were meant to be, knew and felt:
you were meant to be: my sidekick, my wife, my
last part of life.



Note: It would be unkind of me to finish this book without a world of appreciation to and for my wife, of ten years—actually she’s been more a sidekick, comrade, and then my help or my wife as the Good Book Says. And I figured what a better way of expressing my appreciation for her than by giving her the last poem of the book (‘A Poet’s Love’)

No: 2768/8-2-2010
Dedicated to Rosa Penaloza de Siluk (Written in Lima, Peru)