An Excerpt From "Search Sharer,"
by Martin Cobin
I’m joyful in my ignorance
seeking to know the unknowable
knowing searching the source of fulfillment.
Out beyond beyond beyond
beyond the star no longer there
light still delights bringing beauty
through the velvet night.
Date creation of the universe;
predict the time as if you don’t pretend
but believe you really know the end
within a billion years or so.
Yet I will ask you can you undertake
the task of telling me
before creation what, following finality what.
The universe for all its magnitude is but a part.
Infinity? Eternity? There are limits
to my human mind.
I can’t comprehend “no margins,”
“no beginning,” “no end.”
Nor can I even understand all
with which I interact upon the earth.
No need to probe the nanosphere
to vivify my inability,
however much I try, to understand what’s small
even small as creatures like myself,
tiny measured on the boundless scale of space.
Despite all this I’m joyful.
You think I’m mad because I say
I’ll live a thousand years or more
although I know it isn’t so if I accept
what you mean by the word “alive.”
The situation is the animal in me
is capable of deeds that make me weep.
Although you take me for a madman
I must laugh.
I have to dance—with legs and arms
with all the parts of me you can see
and inwardly, responding to my need
to cope with what I cannot understand.
There’s beauty, love, glistening snow on peaks,
full moons, companionship, flowers,
fires safely framed in fireplaces,
flames that crackle, hypnotize,
delicious banquets, perfumes, singing birds,
pianos, trumpets, violins, guitars.
Stars shine at night, museums display fine art
adorning walls and mounted in the halls,
experience of silence, inner peace—
all this along with human beasts
that torture, rape, destroy, burn books, and kill.
I need right here and now to live.
Although much horror cannot be denied
I can’t allow myself to be depressed.
I will not close my eyes, refuse to see
nor will I seek escape through suicide.
I have to laugh, at me if nothing else.
For those who will not dwell
on how it all will end
who’d keep the focus where it has to be
it helps, my friend, to be a little mad.
It’s difficult,
complex!
Have you the intellect required
or is your mind as mine had been
for years
mired by the seeming mud of ignorance?
When I was young as once
I was
I read the fable of the race
between the tortoise and the
hare,
an artificial tale with no relation to reality.
other than the
lesson it was meant to teach.
I didn’t learn.
I was an oddball then, as
now,
just didn’t get the point.
I thought as told, the story
showed
the fun the hare could have
because he didn’t care who won the
race.
I also thought the tortoise was content
to face the fact he couldn’t
really
win a race against the hare
and simply moved unhurried
at his
normal pace.
You want to know how this applies to me
now that, no longer
young, I’m well aware
of the message meant?
I see myself as both tortoise
and hare.
The race so many run to who knows where
is one I don’t expect to
win,
one I believe, indeed, cannot be won.
I care more, therefore, for fun
along the route
as I travel at a pace
that suits my temperament.
You
shake your head in disbelief
because you are my friend,
aware of how I
live?
You wonder how an idealist like me
is just concerned with having
fun?
It’s not “just” having fun.
But even focusing alone on
that
consider what I meant by “fun,”
what can be done for having
fun.
In forests where the trees seem numberless
there are seasons
when
beetles ravage, fires rage.
What protection from destruction can be
given?
Fire-fighting crews are organized,
scientists develop sprays to
battle bugs,
undergrowth is cleared, fire breaks are made,
yet there are
fires, acreage is lost.
I can, myself, do little yet I do a bit.
I can
tell you for example that
an evergreen behind my house stands tall
as it
can stand. As yet it isn’t much
more tall than I. So when the snowflakes
fall
their burden placed upon the tree is such
as makes it bend and droop
to touch the ground.
The sky will clear, the sun will melt the snow,
the
tree will rise—most times.
But since I’ve found
the sun can be too slow, I
often go
(aware that what is bent too long may break)
and shake the snow
away to free the tree.
And so around, each one a turn will take—
the
evergreen, the elements, and me.
You know there’s joy in learning how to
play
this quiet game of chasing snow away.
Good enough, you say,
but
what of the greater damage done?
Why does lightning strike, flames fly
high
wildlife flee?
Why do giant ponderosas topple to the ground?
Why
are ashes left where once were homes?
Why do fire-fighters die?
And what
will come of them?
Is there some meaning, pattern, purpose?
Is there any
comfort after tragedy?
Must not more be told than the tale
of a single
backyard tree?
You ask what has been asked
for centuries.
You search for answers as I have searched.
You want to know
of God, creation,
infinity, eternity, morality,
behavior in this life and
after death.
You want to know if there is meaning, purpose,
just as I
would know. I too am seeking.
So far I have no answers I can share with
you.
The best that I can do is share my search.
by Martin Corbin
Carmen M. Pursifull
Publisher/Hawk
Productions.
