Let us not speak of GodAs if He were the nightmare of a naughty child,    Or a white lie for a widow,Or a conscript’s consolation on the battlefield.    Let us instead be awedBy the nothingness we’ve chosen not to be awed by,    The shade whose earthly shadowWe’re standing in, the lie cast by a happy lie.    The face we turn away,Let us turn it toward the others, let us find them out,    The ones who know the wayA sure thing looks when rounded with a little doubt,    The same ones every dayWho, kneeling all together in a common room,    Pray for their pets and prayAs well for us, their company in a common doom.    Let’s take no satisfaction,But concentrate on what we say when we say no:    That dead we are the same,That time falls fast across the fading light like snow,    That man is an anxious motionOf matter upon matter, liquor upon tongue,    The neurotransmitter’s flameUpon the dendrite’s kindling—bright, and not for long.