WORK IN PROGRESS

Saturday, April 25, 2015

WORK IN PROGRESS

WORK IN PROGRESS

Note:

Most of this blog contains essays and songs

written since 2012; but now and then,

it seems appropriate to reach back into

"my archives," so to speak,

and retrieve an old work

and present it anew.

Such is this work.

A  Master poem

by

Francis William Bessler,

Laramie, Wyoming

3/21/2004

Thank you, Heavenly Parents,

for my wonderful life.

I awake in the morning,

having slept quietly in the night.

I jump out of bed

and run naturally in the house

to get a feel for living

and to make of life my spouse.

I look in the mirror

at the reflection that looks at me

as I see all I am

and to see life springing free.

The hormones in my body

get slimmer as I grow old

and members act a bit more tired

and less and less bold.

But it’s good to know the life I have

whatever that life is

because I’m a work in progress,

and in me, there is no sin.

But it’s just not my gender,

I attend to, you see.

There’s more than genitals

that comprise the one that is me.

I look into the mirror

and I see a chest there too

and I know that beneath it,

a heart is beating

that makes my pulse a truth.

A person is a fool, I think,

who does not recognize

that Life itself is a Miracle

and should be seen as a prize.

Every time you look at your self,

it should seem like you just won

the grandest lottery of all,

for you are God’s son -

or perhaps God’s daughter,

for a girl is as good as a guy

because we are all works in progress,

spirits energized.

People tell me you cannot accept

the person that you are

because long ago your parents fell

and it’s for you to stick like tar.

They say that because your mother

may have felt weak,

when you were born, you inherited her

and like her must speak.

I love my parents, but I know

it need not be the case

that if my father was, in fact, weak,

I need not repeat his state.

Each of us is free to make

of life what we will

and no one who has gone before us

need be used as a still

to make the same wine

that our heritage saw fit to make

because we are all works in progress,

and progress should be our fate.

So let those who think that conduct

should be the way it’s always been

stand aside and make room

for one who knows no sin.

I am full of God and there is no room

for sin in me to abide;

for where God is, no sin can be,

and if no sin, no reason to be shy.

I am not creating myself,

anymore than you are creating you

and I have no right to denounce

my Creator by feeling blue.

Life is a Gift, but it also comes

attached with an Obligation.

If you want to know all you are,

then give in to Celebration.

Go natural all you can –

to know all you can be and know

that you are a work in progress,

born to be free.

It’s said that Jesus died

on the cross so that I may live,

but let us never forget,

he gave what was his to give.

The lesson of his death should

let us know the reason that he died

and that was to show himself and us

how our souls can be wise.

You cannot live by taking life –

no matter what the reason;

and those who take another’s life

are guilty of soulful treason.

Any time I bid myself or another

to swing at you,

I swing back at me

and I punch me in the soul

and lose my liberty.

So, yes, Christ did die for me

to show me how to go;

and, as a work in progress,

I accept his show.

It is said that Jesus rose

into Heaven after he had died;

but the truth is he was always

in Heaven, even in this life.

For Heaven is more than just a place;

it’s also a state of soul.

If one is in Heaven, it’s so

wherever one does go.

And so it is too with Hell –

should that be your direction.

If Hell is your choice now,

then Hell will likely be your next selection.

Our lives here in this place

are only the beginning

of where we choose to take our souls

and do our soulful spinning.

I think Jesus lived and died

to free souls from hateful captivity;

and as a work in progress,

I am being drawn to be free.

Life is perhaps complicated,

but it’s also simple too.

We need not know the details

to be sure of the simple truth.

The simple truth is that all are Divine

for God is everywhere

and no one need worry

about being banned by God in fear.

God is everywhere and therefore

inside of each of us.

Knowing that is what makes

of any life one that is just.

Jesus lived to tell us that all

are equally children of God

because God is making us all

and upon no one does God trod.

And so I leave you to ponder

just what I’ve stated in these lines.

Like me, you are a work in progress,

unfolding in life and time.

Commentary:

I call this a “master” poem because it addresses the most major of life’s issues for me.  It is not just a little “ditty” that offers only fluff & entertainment.  Call it a poetic bible that offers in brief rhyme & reason how I look at life.  It is not so much to state how others must look at life.  It is only to state how I do look at life. 

In stanza 1, I talk about the need to embrace life as it is and the need for the soul to see the body as a companion.  As it is, I believe that souls pre-exist and survive bodies.  I believe that souls select bodies and are not selected by bodies or installed by God.  As such, it is easy for me to see that my soul should consider my body a companion and not an agent of conflict.  Why would my soul have selected my body if it did not want it?  And if my soul wants my body, then the two should act as companions.  Of course, if one believes that body selection is neither soulful nor Godly, but somehow, other, then one is not likely to come to the same conclusion about body and soul as I.  Sadly, I think, people have not thought this one out.  They assume that somehow God makes a soul and sticks into a body – and then somehow corrupts the body so that the soul must seek liberation from the body as the very course of salvation.  Such foolish non-thinking has made for a hellish world because in the minds of most who rule, body and soul are somehow natural enemies of one another – and enemies of God too – until such a proverbial time that God comes into the presence of one or both.  Unfortunately, such foolish non-thinking is the basis of much human morality.  Is it any wonder with non-thinking like that, that the world has never known peace?  At the root of all social conflict, a sense of conflict between body and soul precedes it.  Take away that assumed and irrational conflict – and peace would result.

In stanza 2, I talk about the need to see Life itself as a Miracle because the source of it is God.

In stanza 3, I talk about the foolishness of claiming that one must repeat a precursor’s mistakes.

In stanza 4, I talk about the need of each to set their own course, free of the mistakes of the past.

In stanza 5, I talk about the lesson that should be drawn from the crucifixion of Jesus.

In stanza 6, I talk about Heaven and Hell being only states of mind, enacted in places, and that either once begun must be repeated in the near or far future, until such time that a state of mind is changed.  We live Heaven or Hell; and we take whichever we choose wherever we go.

In stanza 7, I talk about the simplicity of a life lived in wisdom.  We need not know any of the details about life to get life right.  All it takes is to realize that we are all equally Divine and act like it.

 It is said that Jesus offered that compassion is the way into Heaven.  I agree, but compassion for me is not the traditional “feeling sorry for” another, but rather “feeling equal with” another – and not just any other, but all others.  Spiritually, compassion – or the compassion of individual salvation – is knowing that all are equal because all equally have God.  Those who lack that sense of equality are those who cannot gain admission into the Heaven of Jesus – even though they may do all sort of works with the idea of impressing God as in trying to influence God.  One either does or does not have compassion.  In the end, there is no bargaining with God.  There is only being saved by virtue of knowing and acting like everyone is equal.  Spiritual compassion  must go beyond “feeling sorry for."  It must embrace “feeling equal with” – or it will be lacking in stature with what one might call Salvation. 

Of course, I would encourage my vision for others; but encouragement is as much as I can offer.  No one should offer more.  Each of us has a right to form our own opinions; and no one of us has a right to stand in another’s way.  I am free to write my own poem and determine my own “bible."  And so it should be with everyone.