Faith
A religious man on the radio did say
That the opposite of faith is doubt
Certainty saw no light of his day
And all non-belief was ruled out
A pleasant enough lad
Whose grasp of good logic was truly sad
But, we must have faith that the sun will rise
Or at least that the earth turns around it
A deed we see with our very own eyes
Nothing, apparently, can roundly confound it
Yet can we be totally sure
That this phenomenon will, daily, endure?
Well, if the world doesn’t last till tomorrow
All that I write will have no meaning
Our neighbours may beg, steal or borrow
Talk of repayment would be demeaning
We’ll be as dead as the nail of a door
And there’ll be no such thing as rich or poor
So, let’s agree to start a doubt-based foundation
Simply to prove a logical point
There could be branches across the breadth of the nation
Led by those who no-one else would anoint
Who would posit that certainty could never exist
And, yet, from all true non-belief desist
My thoughts leave even me confused
For clearly one cannot dispute all belief
Concepts, by the learned may be used and abused
But to the critical mind still give no relief
Ideas with which we continually tussle
Oh where, oh where, is today’s Bertrand Russell?
So, let’s all take faith off the proverbial table
For the sake of this dastardly dissertation
And imagine a world without fiction or fable
Though allowing occasional, poetic, flirtation
Faith will still seem to be needed
Even if the faithful need not be heeded