I’ve been told,
I’ve been warned
even before I comprehended human language
one should revere Text and Revelation
and should prize the Holy Book
I have been told
by Priest, High Priest, Highest Priest,
and Even Higher than Highest Priest,
and all these Declared Representatives of God on Earth
and I have been told to revere the name of God
(for some reason, these Declarers say God is a He;
they’ve had a look, I am to presume)
and to prostrate myself before the Divine Leader
and I’ve been told, advised, counseled, warned
what is right, what is just
and what is good, what is allowed
all boundaries delineated
in the Book
and I’ve been told
by parent, teacher, clerics, Holy Men and Holy Women
and I have been told by Institutions, Foundations of God
operating as Family Trusts on Planet Earth
and I’ve been told, sure –
but still I put aside
I put all away
for when I look within myself
when I look in quiet
at the world and what unfolds about
all I see is the unfolding of beauty
and so it is the unfolding of beauty that one witnesses
a beauty beyond word and symbol and book
an unfolding beyond dogma and theology
and rules and conventions
and so it is the beauty I see, that I witness
and beyond that and before that
there is nothing, nothing more than that nameless beauty