Lucas Price is a creative writing student at GCC. Initially inspired by a crisis between faith and conformity, this poem of seeks to confront and sort out those mixed-up thoughts and feelings.
Persons
Would I be less of a person if, say,
I made a mistake?
If I forgot something?
If I looked in the wrong places?
If I followed the wrong conclusions?
And then the costs drowned me
until I lost my lungs?
And how about my sentiments:
like if noise invades my space
or if my silence shoos people away?
If my beliefs clash
with a [growing] consensus?
If I spot holes in their logic,
yet mine is “preposterous”?
If my “greater good” is something
other than freedom?
If the blood of thousands, millions even,
seems worth one more saved soul?
Now what if I did a conscious evil:
such as if I stole and hoarded?
If I did not donate kindness [back]?
If I planted wounds and bruises,
be they physical or emotional?
If I scorned the benevolent?
If I defied my bodily design?
If I did anything without full faith?
These may seem destructive;
backwards; blasphemous.
You might see me as hopeless;
dangerous; disgusting.
But splinters inhabit all our eyes;
shouldn’t we help pull them out?