The Doubt

Inspired by my jealousy toward men and women who still have belief even in the hardest tragedies.

The doubt feeds
The doubt consumes
It swallows me whole

The doubt burns
The doubt hurts
It never lets go

The demon of doubt
is worse than gout
A chronic condition
loathing submission
It's just hell on wheels
dining on the soul
for all of its meals

Man has been beat on
Man has been peed on
Man has been spit on
Man has been s**t on

Man has been punched in the guts
Man has been kicked in the nuts
Man has been fucked in the butt

But his overall belief has remained
untouched, unscathed, unblemished,
steadfast, rock-solid, a concrete pillar
that hasn't been weathered
that hasn't been eroded
that hasn't been worn away
that hasn't decomposed a shred

And if a solitary member
of the human experience
makes claims to the contrary,
they are the storytellers
they are the yarn spinners
they are the delusional ones
since the conclusion
is that obvious
is that blatant
is that manifest
is that transparent

Belief survives virally
since we virally survive

And the doubt is just
another belief, not a
shred divergent from
faith itself

And the faith feeds
as the doubt does

And the faith burns
as the doubt does

The faith is also a
chronic condition
loathing submission,
a being that feeds
on the soul for all
of its meals

And so the battle
rages inside with
total depravity and
predictable circularity

The doubt and
the faith at odds
until the mortal coil
is forever shaken away,
like a pair of cheap devices
purchased from a box store
once they meet the law of
gravity and the kitchen floor

The resulting mess is the state
out of the soul, polar opposites
sprinkled and strewn together
making a vague yin-yang pattern
that the world at large has come
to know on sight, like the Golden
Arches or the Christian Cross

Yin and Yang,
Salt and Pepper,
Doubt and Faith,

Dichotomy defined
by complementary
congruence, and
they react like
sodium and water
and can burn for
a lifetime if the
fuel is plentiful
enough

And they still feed
And they still burn
And it will cease
at some point

When and where
are left up to the
agent in question

Reviews

[Coyote Poetry]

Doubt allow us to see our weakness come alive and make us wish we were in a better place.
"But his overall belief has remained
untouched, unscathed, unblemished,
steadfast, rock-solid, a concrete pillar"
A very good ending to a excellent poem.
Coyote

[MaggieSummers]

Extreme write!

[WynterPhoenix]

This is an honest piece. I like the word play.

[Rene Velez]

no positive without negative, no light without darkness, the universe has it's twisted humor, nice write Kenneth

[Ruth]

Sweety, this is really outstanding work! Not much I can say except, wow! One of those days where what I am reading is blowing me away! LOL
Brilliant poem! xx

[Helpless]

extremely interesting and well written piece! captivating to say the least....

[OT]

ooo very nice piece - I like the repetition throughout - it gives it a nice base almost - a foundation which the words work from - I also like how you span through the variety of different things as you go through - ending it well "when and where are left up to the agent in question" - nice

[Liza]

bold and brilliant piece; one does not live with the other...all is divided and the contrasts compliment...the tension and turmoil is power and submission - we are always influenced to pick one side and never stand in between yet it is the in between where we find objectivity, neutrality, acceptance and reality.

And the faith feeds
as the doubt does

And the faith burns
as the doubt does

[Judy Ponceby]

Brilliant caustic heart wrenching write. Perhaps this is why I diverge from having Faith and Doubt.......What I keep close to my heart is Hope. Hope is gentle and eternal and unlike Faith and Doubt not demanding of my very being especially when it is in peril of being sundered. Very deep write and well done.