Playing God
I don’t want to play God, but we all do.
God is in our conscious awareness of
Life and death of
Taking and giving of
Existence in
Love or
Fear or
Retribution of
World leaders
Pining for
Power to
Lord over those
They perceive as pawns in
The virtual reality within
Their minds but
Me, I don’t want to play God in
Even the slightest of ways
When tonight I clean
My guinea pigs cage knowing in
Three short days
Henry will be no more because
I made the decision to
End his life knowing
A cancerous tumor grows
On and in him
And as his weight shrinks
I know he can’t win this battle so
I play God
I know the truth:
His time is short.
I know his fate as
I watch him
Watching me as
He happily chuts along
Making sure I do everything correctly.
This is what he does
This is his routine.
For him,
It’s just another day in his life but
I carry the weight of
Knowing in three days
Henry’s routine will be no more.
I know this and I don’t want to know.
Knowing is hard.
Playing God is hard even if it’s out of love.
Yet, I think of
Those in power playing God with
Our lives
Knowing we will suffer and die by
The choices they make
And yet,
They won’t give a single tear to
A single thought of
You or me.
Knowing I am crying over a guinea pig
And they,
They won’t waste their tears on us because
The God they play is themselves
And it’s for themselves.
I don’t know their God
Nor do I want to.
I know my God
And she knows to play God isn’t a game.
I don’t play.
I work directly in
The thickness and heaviness of
Responsibility
I feel the depth of
Knowing life and death of
Understanding whether
It’s 1 or 8 billion whether
A guinea pig or a human
All life is significant
And the responsibility to
Each life is
A responsibility to each other to
Trust that the choices we make are in love
And for the betterment of all involved.
Being God is work.
And we need to stop placing our responsibility on
A God we can’t see
And start putting it on
The God we see in the mirror.
This starts with asking one simple question:
What kind of God are you?
CL January 2025