The Petition (1 of 3)

The Petition of Baptiste De Guerre

On Behalf of the Poet Jean Ami

And Other Victims of War

 

If there is one thing

I would have you hear,

 

It is this:

 

You created Man in Your image,

And therefore, each man will reflect

A variation of that image to the world.

 

Like You, he will incorporate an urgency to act

With a predilection to imagine and create.

And since he cannot be other than what

These attributes allow him to be,

 

He will be what You meant him to be

 

In perpetual revision, renewal,

Forgetfulness, and wonder.

 

II

 

Each man knows that his universe

Will at times be visible to other men,

And he makes You known by making

His universe available to their scrutiny

 

But he knows that other men will not embrace his universe

Or honor its rules with proper admiration and understanding,

Because they are themselves unique reflections of Your image,

And are therefore bound by the rules that govern their universe.

 

Yet, he joys in the knowledge that his universe

Has always been known and loved by You �"

 

Even those parts of his universe

That he cannot know and are

Forever hidden from him.

 

III

 

Each man is similar to You in that

 

His truth is truth

 

And his life is life.

 

His birth is the advent of time,

And his death brings about

The end of the world.[1]

 

And although a new universe is

Thought to burst upon him when he dies,

He cannot know if this is so because that reality

Is not a part of the universe You allow him to know.

 

Only a drop of hope is given to him,

And all his faith derives from that single drop,

And he has no impetus other than that to go forward.

But my dear friend did make that drop into an ocean

That he navigated in love and constant thanksgiving.

---

[1] A religious belief as much as a reasoned philosophical proposition, Paris was convinced that unless there is a mind to perceive and think about a physical object, that object cannot be said to exist. To him, the only mind that can perceive and think about a particular object is the one that perceives and thinks about it. If the one who perceives and thinks about that object passes out of the physical world, the object passes with him because he was the only one who perceived and thought about that object under the exact circumstances that he did.