Unsettling But Certain Truth
Nature provides that we are conceived in lust,
birthed in pain, and raised up in lives of toil,
discontent, and anguish, which more often than
not, we attempt to mitigate by taking refuge in
vain illusions and flashes of comfort and elation.
Our time comes to conceive in lust and birth
in pain, except, of course, in cases where nature
denies opportunity, ability, or inclination. And
when it is done, we eventually die, some of us
relieved, some gripped with remorse, some fearful,
some confident of eternal life with sweet reunions,
and some plagued with doubt and disbelief.
So what can we glean from the experience that is
untainted by vain illusions and flashes of comfort
and elation? It is, of course, the unsettling but
certain truth that we are born, we breed, and we
eventually die as nature or mishap provides.
No evidence exists in support of anything beyond,
yet reason tells us that nonexistence of evidence is
not evidence of nonexistence, only that we simply
do not know whether anything beyond exists or not,
except, of course, by faith in our vain illusions.
Copyright © 2013 Frank Zahn. Published in The Criterion: An International Journal in English, Volume 15, Issue 2, April 2024,
p. 451. - https://www.the-criterion.com/V15/n2/Zahn.pdf.