Accelerated Adolescence

Self-Criticism

As a note, this is not my best poetry (or nearly). However, in a fit of caffeine and self reflection this came out. The continuation of the post is in the words of Shoghi Effendi. Enjoy. And, for Helen, thanks for the Shoghi Effendi. I read this when I was in Gambia but wouldn't have lingered on this passage if you hadn't mentioned it.

White picket lines, traded
For white picket fences.
In gardens we hide, jaded,
And speak in past tenses.

Sub-urban schools
Are mini Vietnams,
Where kids carry guns
And detonate bombs.

We speak and we speak,
And still we do nothing,
For peace we don�t seek;
Our hearts are unwilling.

Metaphors, symbols, sages,
For all our wars and truces
And all across the ages,
They are still just excuses.

�Our children are the future
If we raise them right.
When darkness gets darker
They won�t take flight.�

Instead of talking and preaching,
Instead of hiding and waiting,
We should be praying and teaching,
Then, the change we�ll be creating!

Friends and fellow-heirs of the Kingdom of Bah�'u'll�h:

A tempest, unprecedented in its violence, unpredictable in its course, catastrophic in its immediate effects, unimaginably glorious in its ultimate consequences, is at present sweeping the face of the earth. Its driving power is remorselessly gaining in range and momentum. Its cleansing force, however much undetected, is increasing with every passing day. Humanity, gripped in the clutches of its devastating power, is smitten by the evidences of its resistless fury. It can neither perceive its origin, nor probe its significance, nor discern its outcome. Bewildered, agonized and helpless, it watches this great and mighty wind of God invading the remotest and fairest regions of the earth, rocking its foundations, deranging its equilibrium, sundering its nations, disrupting the homes of its peoples, wasting its cities, driving into exile its kings, pulling down its bulwarks, uprooting its institutions, dimming its light, and harrowing up the souls of its inhabitants.

"The time for the destruction of the world and its people," Bah�'u'll�h's prophetic pen has proclaimed, "hath arrived." "The hour is approaching," He specifically affirms, "when the most great convulsion will have appeared." "The promised day is come, the day when tormenting trials will have surged above your heads, and beneath your feet, saying: 'Taste ye what your hands have wrought!'" "Soon shall the blasts of His chastisement beat upon you, and the dust of hell enshroud you." And again: "And when the appointed hour is come, there shall suddenly appear that which shall cause the limbs of mankind to quake." "The day is approaching when its [civilization's] flame will devour the cities, when the Tongue of Grandeur will proclaim: 'The Kingdom is God's, the Almighty, the All-Praised!'" "The day will soon come," He, referring to the foolish ones of the earth, has written, "whereon they will cry out for help and receive no answer." "The day is approaching," He moreover has prophesied, "when the wrathful anger of the Almighty will have taken hold of them. He, verily, is the Omnipotent, the All-Subduing, the Most Powerful. He shall cleanse the earth from the defilement of their corruption, and shall give it for an heritage unto such of His servants as are nigh unto Him."

"As to those who deny Him Who is the Sublime Gate of God," the B�b, for His part, has affirmed in the Qayyum-i-Asma', "for them We have prepared, as justly decreed by God, a sore torment. And He, God, is the Mighty, the Wise." And further, "O peoples of the earth! I swear by your Lord! Ye shall act as former generations have acted. Warn ye, then, yourselves of the terrible, the most grievous vengeance of God. For God is, verily, potent over all things." And again: "By My glory! I will make the infidels to taste, with the hands of My power, retributions unknown of anyone except Me, and will waft over the faithful those musk-scented breaths which I have nursed in the midmost heart of My throne."

Dear friends! The powerful operations of this titanic upheaval are comprehensible to none except such as have recognized the claims of both Bah�'u'll�h and the B�b. Their followers know full well whence it comes, and what it will ultimately lead to. Though ignorant of how far it will reach, they clearly recognize its genesis, are aware of its direction, acknowledge its necessity, observe confidently its mysterious processes, ardently pray for the mitigation of its severity, intelligently labor to assuage its fury, and anticipate, with undimmed vision, the consummation of the fears and the hopes it must necessarily engender.

(Shoghi Effendi, The Promised Day is Come, p. 3)

Posted by Mendon at March 26, 2005 7:08 PM