Seeds and Weeds

poetry & prose by JJ Johnson

Chapter 3: Faith: Search Within and Beyond

Seeds And Weeds is a philosophically expressive compilation of poetry and prose, offering progressive views on equality, justice, politics, peace, war, environment, nature, fate, faith, family, friendship, introspection, and poetic inspiration.

The poems within are more than simply a collection of verse with splashes of imagery. Written in the moment, the poetry here is sometimes harsh, but always honest. Digging deeply into the essence of poetic creation, they have not been conjured from the casual observations on life that some would accept as poetic inspiration. These works are the raw emotions articulated in words that have been inspired by a lifetime of experiences.

Creatively expressed in rhyme and reason, this book challenges the mind and heart to find a better way through observations and feelings on the rise and fall of character.

Faith: Search Within & Beyond

excerpts

Poems: Great Unknown & Touch

All Prose from Chapter 3 included

 Prose

            For as long as I can remember, I have been searching. When I was a young boy, going to church with my family, I listened to the sermons given each Sunday by the priests at St. Mary’s. I listened to the Nuns who taught the school. I heard the stories, followed the rules and for the most part, believed what I was being taught. But every now and then, something would seem a little far fetched to me and I would ask a question about it. That was when I learned that nuns were not as holy as they seemed. It seemed a very strange thing to me that women who had devoted their lives to serving Jesus Christ and teaching children the ways of forgiveness and the love of God, could be such wicked witches beneath their habits.

            Why is it a sin to ask what one does not understand? I suppose it is easier to get out the paddle and whack a child on the ass or crack them across the knuckles, than it is to admit they don’t have all the answers. Even referring one to a priest would have been better than making us afraid to ask. I had many questions as a child in the Catholic society and never felt as though there was anyone I could ask to get answers. Even when I wasn’t bent over a desk and spanked, the best I could hope for was, “The Lord works in mysterious ways”, or “We can’t question God’s will, we must simply follow his word”.

            The mystery of faith still eludes me, not just faith in God and Jesus, but in humanity and in myself. A lack of self-esteem has had a detrimental effect in every aspect of my life. Arrogance has crept into the caverns where esteem should be and so many missed opportunities have left a trail of craters in their wake that mark my soul like a lunar map. I believe that with self-esteem, all things become possible. This is why I say that self-esteem is everything. Not that it truly is everything, but because it is the key that unlocks doors to all things. Having the confidence to take chances in the face of potential failure is essential to success. If one does not believe achievement is possible, the first steps towards accomplishment will never be taken. Self-esteem can be built on a solid foundation in the home with positive reinforcement. If no one takes the time to lift a child up in praise, the child will learn to fall into obscurity and find comfort there. I do not believe this, I know it to be true!

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Great Unknown

Some people reach inside themselves
To learn the great unknown
Still others crawl inside their shells
Not wishing to be shown

I want to turn my insides out
And solve the riddle soon
I wish to know what life's about
Before I reach my tomb

A lifetime is so short
And so what of our souls?
Do we stand before God in court
Facing a fate foretold?

Existence hangs upon a thread
Which dangles endlessly
So what will happen when I'm dead
If I don't hold the key?

It won't be long until he's here
I have no time to waste
Will I accept Christ as Savior
Before by God I'm faced?

Created On: 12/24/1982

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Pass On True Freedom

The fear of wrongdoing

Set ablaze in brimstone and fire

Unbind indulgence first

Pass on the freedom to desire

Only when a choice is made

Can truth set a soul free from the liar

Virtue stagnates in church

When lessons are preached to the choir

The fence before trespass

Constructs a mountain to trust sought

Hands tied behind the front

Holding back sin but not the thought

With no choices to make

The battle of innocence un-fought

Leads not to temptation

But further from the lessons untaught

Created On: 12/26/1982

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Prose

            Even in my youth, I knew that knowledge would never lead to faith. Contemplating this as often as I have, it is not surprising that I have written about it several times over the years. “A Question Of Faith” is one of my earlier poems on the topic. I was less cynical in my younger years, though losing my optimism for realizing faith. In spite of my cynicism, I have not lost any of my enthusiasm for finding it during this lifelong search.

I am constantly in search of an answer
To a question I'm not even sure can be asked
At least not by those who cling to life as their eternal dream
Am I worthy of the answer while living the dream?

To know the answer would leave my soul defenseless
And so would being trapped in the shadow of doubt
The paradox within my soul is a question of faith
For the sins I have embraced, I question my fate

It may be true that more than one truth exists
That each and every person perceives their own
But after this life on Earth is over and done
Is that still true, or is there only one?

Created On: 02/22/1985

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Prose

            I purchased a copy of the book, “1999 Poet’s Market” in June of ’99. When I started reading it, I noticed they had a contest to write a poem about your favorite word. Then I read that the contest entries had to have been sent in several months earlier. I was a little disappointed, but I was also relieved because I didn’t really want to write a poem for a contest. I have this opinion about writing for rewards that has kept me from entering any sort of poetry competition and is the reason I held off writing this book for so long. But the idea of writing a poem about my favorite word appealed to me, so I decided to put pen to paper anyway. The only question I had was, what was my favorite word?

            There were really only two choices for me, deciding between the two things I have wanted all my life yet still elude me, love and faith. I had to choose but the process wasn’t an easy one by any stretch of the imagination. I thought about which one I wanted most, but there were so many factors to consider. I reflected deeply about which one I craved enough to declare as my preferred word. I suppose I could have written two poems, but I decided that I had to choose one for it to really be my favorite word. It came down to the idea that if I could achieve faith, love would naturally follow. If I could not have love without faith, faith it would be.

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I believe my favorite word is Faith
No other thing have I sought every day of my life
It continues to elude me
I want to find it, to embrace it

I've prayed for Faith but I know not to whom
No one has ever answered me, still I try to be heard
Sometimes out loud when I'm alone
Now and then in a crowd quietly

Will I ever learn the words true meaning?
In all my life I have never had Faith in anyone
Not in myself, not in Jesus
Not in the prayers I've prayed to him

No other word crosses my thoughts more often
Not even love has filled my soul with so much desire
Desire to know, to know Faith
But to know it, is not Faith at all

Created On: 06/06/1999

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Prose

            I don’t think hiding my own fears and doubts would be the right thing to do when I am putting others to task over their own, so I decided to include “Faith In What I Don't Believe” in this book. I was considering holding it for a future book of poetry based on my darker poems, which I hesitate to even mention it at this point, but being open about internal struggles is, for the most part, what this book is about.

            Everyone goes through difficult times and I have had my fair share. Sometimes I feel like I have had more than I can take, more than I deserve to have to live with. It is in those times when I have wanted to find a way out of life, when I could find no evidence of better days ahead, in life or after life. Without faith, the end of life equates to an end of pain, at least in the mind. It doesn’t matter what is going on in the mind if God does exist and fate takes us to one of two destinations.

            It is hard to believe that I am still here when I think of all the times I have given up completely on life. But perhaps it wasn’t as complete as I thought since I am still here. Nevertheless, I have not yet come to terms with the things that brought me down to that level of despair and the possibility of returning to those depths still haunts me. I have often thought it was the fear of death that kept me from ending my life. That’s not much of a reason. It should have been a desire to live that pulled me through.

            I am not prepared to die. I have goals, things I want to accomplish while I am still alive. During my moments of doubt, those goals weren’t enough when I thought I had no reason to live. Will finding faith change my perception of the importance of achieving my goals?

God save me from myself before it's too late
Jesus heal my empty heart before I can't find your love
Stop me from deciding to change your plan for my fate
Give me a reason to live, please send a sign from above

There's too much past piled on top of me to rise up
I can't see anything in my future but more of my past
Tell me is the grail your blood or just an empty cup?
An empty cup filled with salvation from the meal you served last

Does any of it matter now that I have decided to die?
Where are you now, where are your footprints in the sand?
Or is it all a bunch of nice stories masking an elaborate lie?
Now I ponder to put my life in your hands or take it by my own hand

To find piece of mind would have helped a long time ago
But now the peace I seek is only for my heart
To put it's aching to rest, to gather up the pain and let go
For the life I neglected and allowed to fall apart

There's no one to blame but me, no guilt lies beyond my flesh
My weakness lies within where I let it take control
And everything I never did left my mind a mess
A state of mind reflected in the pooled tears of my lost soul

But there's no maid who's coming to my home to dust off my eyes
No one is coming to help me clean up the disaster I've become
And my sins will follow me to my grave, so many forgive-less lies
Confession may free my soul but none of them can be undone

So I have no doubts about why you have turned your back on me
God I don't blame you if this was written in your list of things to do
And now my only hope is to find faith in what I don't believe
Jesus where are you, where are you, where are you?

Created On: 07/26/2002

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Prose

            “Unwilling To Let Go” is an introspective prayer to the part of God that exists within. If God is indeed everywhere, then a part of God is within each of us. If that is true, then perhaps he can feel what I feel. I often wonder about what God can feel, if he is able to experience human pain and love, or is it something all together different for him? If God knows what I think, what I feel and how much I truly want to believe, why hasn’t he allowed me to find him? How can he be inside me and yet I have no sense that can detect his presence? I can’t let go of life so long as grasp the essence of what faith is.

Can you feel the silence
Of vibrations gone unheard
From the beating of my heart
Though it never spoke a word

Yet you know how I feel
Can you read my open mind?
tHis light penetrates closed eyes
Even if your heart is blind

The truth will set us free
Through beliefs we cannot know
tHis light, living eyes can't see
Life: unwilling to let go

Created On: 03/09/2003

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Prose

            Another dream about Satin, this one with political overtones. About a month after the Iraqi war began I had been getting more involved with the peace movement. I wasn’t convinced the things I had been reading about WMD’s were true. I was on e-mail lists from several progressive groups that I had more faith in disseminating the truth than the mainstream media. I knew Saddam Hussein was a terrible man, still, I had serious doubts that he had anything to do with terrorism or that he had nuclear weapons.

            I just didn’t feel that attacking Iraq made any sense, especially when we needed to continue hunting for Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda with connections to the 9/11 attacks. And now it appears that it would indeed have made more sense to pursue bin Laden instead of Hussein because Osama is still out there inspiring more terrorism while Hussein stands trial. Much of what I read about the relationship between Hussein and bin Laden was that they hated each other and couldn’t set aside their differences to attack us.

            But during the first month or so of the war, nothing was really certain. It wasn’t until June that the first real questions about the intelligence began to come out and even then, only small presses were covering it. I still felt that war was wrong, no matter what. I did not feel that enough negotiating had been done and that weapons inspectors were not being listened to. All the while, I was beginning to view the President as a truly evil man. He seemed even more tyrannical to me than Hussein, not caring at all about innocent Iraqis who were dying instead of being liberated.

            I began to wonder if GW was indeed the devil in disguise. While I was having this dream, I kept thinking that I knew who was behind the veil, but I never got a look at his face. His moves were familiar, his voice was an echo that I had heard in the past, his eyes glowed through the cloth that covered his face and I knew I had seen them before, but it was all so surreal. All I could be sure of was that he was more interested in casting doubt into my mind than defeating me in battle. His fists were more accurate than painful, as if he wanted me to suffer without falling too quickly. He wanted me to fight back in anger, and I had a vision of Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker in battle, and then the Emperor. Letting go of my anger was the answer, and like the Emperor in Star Wars, Satin fell into a pit of fire that engulfed him and freed me from my pain.

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When I awoke this day I was not proud
My heart wrapped within a bloodied shroud
The image of his face burned into the cloth
Like a vision from in the mind of a Visigoth
I think the devil slipped past my sleep
Or just dread from my mind adeep
Taunting me like a matador with his red pelisse
Telling me that there is no such thing as peace

Claimed I was nothing but a common fool
Fooled by liberals to be their wrong wing tool
Said to me with breath of fire I'm un-American
Called me a coward, accused me not a man
He so boldly challenged me to a fight
Barking out I was wrong and he was right
He struck me once after I said no
He struck again when I turned to go

Was then I realized he would not stop
He held issues within he would not drop
Yet I held back, offered no defense
Stood against him with my hate for violence
So not one punch was even thrown
Not for anything that was yet unknown
For all his threats still I did not strike
Nor for all his reasons for his dislike

And so it seemed as he gasped and fell
My soul had glimpsed the path to Hell
At the moment his accusations ceased
The guilt I felt inside was quietly released
While deep asleep I faced my inner fear
Rejecting the lies from one so insincere
All doubt cast out as was my inner demon
Risen within, a soaring phoenix-like eudemon

Created On: 04/21/2003

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Prose

            As with the earlier poem “Have You Heard?”, I wrote “The One On My Shoulder - Never Succumb” for a poetry contest, sort of. An online poetry group I am a member of was holding a contest to write a poem with the title “Never Succumb - The One On My Shoulder” which I inspired me to write one, even though I was not going to enter it into the contest. I got this idea in my head about the a devil standing on my shoulder, whispering in my ear, tempting me to do things while reassuring me that everything would be alright.

            So often I’ve felt that I was battling against temptation. Sometimes I lose, but I never give up the fight. I dream about it from time to time. I dreamt I had died, but was not sent to Heaven or Hell. I was given the task of chaperoning Satin through a challenge by God that if every soul in Heaven who he had ever harmed would forgive him, he would be allowed into Heaven. If Satin was successful, I would also be allowed to enter Heaven.

            I didn’t have high hopes that I’d be getting in under the circumstances, but since I didn’t think I deserved to get in anyway, I figured I had nothing to lose. We were at a house outside the pearly gates, waiting for each soul to bring a simple gift of forgiveness that Satin had to humbly accept. At first it was going well, but with each gift, Satin grew more impatient, opening each one and looking in with boredom and disgust. No one was giving him anything he desired, just bits of paper and wood that he had no use for.

            The line grew longer with each gift he accepted. It seemed that as each one passed, two or three more would get in at the end of the line. Soon, we could no longer see the end, as it disappeared into the mist beyond the pearly gates. Satin began grabbing the gifts out of the hands of the souls, demanding they move along, hurrying the next in line to come forward. He was now tossing the boxes into a pile, not even bothering to open them and look inside.

            It turned out there wasn’t a soul in Heaven that Satin hadn’t harmed at some point during their lives. The line seemed endless and he had to wait until all had forgiven him. Even if he got to the end of the eternal line, there was still me. After watching him ungratefully yanking gifts out of the hands of all the redeemed who had ever lived, I knew he was ungrateful and that I could not forgive him. Their forgiveness for his transgressions and temptations was merely a formality; neither of us was going to get into Heaven.

He whispers in my ear of all he'll give to me
How Hell is not so bad, how he will set me free
He tells me his truth has the golden touch
He gives me a choice, says it won't cost too much
Just my soul, he tells "I have none, never needed one
Death is better than life, an eternity of fun”

I will not listen to him or his tempting lies
I pray for the haunting day that he up and dies
Although he wants to take me down with him
Where all lost souls cry, my fate is not so grim
For he has no soul to be cleansed of its sins
While mine has hope of being washed when the end begins

Created On: 09/19/2003

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            Fear, one of the three seeds and a survival instinct, is a tool of both good and evil. Nothing can control us quite like terror. It is why terrorists are terrorists, not because they do terrible things, but because those terrible things frighten us. We expect to feel fear from the threatening forces around us, but we don’t always anticipate that good people will do us harm. So when I was going to Catholic school as a child, I wasn’t expecting the nuns to make me afraid of God or Jesus Christ, the ones who supposedly loves us all. I didn’t know we were supposed to be God fearing, I thought we were supposed to be God loving and that Jesus was going to forgive our sins if only we had faith in him.

            I think one of the things that has made it so hard for me to find that faith is the fear instilled in me by those nuns. It wasn’t just the physical discipline that worried me, it was the spiritual intimidation that had me questioning how God would allow such mean old ladies to be in charge of teaching children about religion and faith. The fear they planted in my mind is still in there all these years later. I am still troubled by the thought that I will go to Hell when I die. And because I have little hope of ever finding the faith I need to ascend into Heaven, I don’t want to die. I know that death is inevitable, and considering my health status, I will likely not have enough time to believe what I want so much to believe.

            But if I can live forever, then I will never have to face my fate. If I can live forever, perhaps then I will have enough time to find true love, if not faith itself. If I never die, I will never know for sure if there is even a Heaven or Hell, which would be preferable to finding myself amidst fire and brimstone.

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I want to be mortal forever
To know my life is mine and mine alone
No end to the flesh
Life over death
No soul to set free
Or apples to tempt me
I do not want to rise into Heaven
Or fall to some torturous place
What I want is to feel
To taste
To smell
And most of all
I want to love
Never ending love
For all I have ever known
Is love never begun
When finally it comes
I don't want to let go
I want to hold on
I want to be mortal forever

Created On: 09/28/2003

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Prose

            Not a day goes by that I do not face one form of temptation or another, and often I give in to those temptations. It always leaves me feeling that I have no hope of salvation, but at the same time, it drives my desire to find faith before it’s too late. I suppose it would be just as easy to stop doing things I know are wrong, but if it were that simple, none of us would need forgiveness. If it were as easy as deciding not to sin, one would have to wonder if any of the TV Evangelists or Catholic Priests would have committed transgressions against their oaths were ever dedicated to doing God’s work.

            Knowing I am not alone in sin does not make it any easier to find clarity in the mist my soul is lost in. I keep hoping that God is going to find some clever way to show me the path to faith. I don’t need a miracle to have faith, miracles walk too fine a line with gifting knowledge. What I really want is to doubt knowledge, to look at the big bang and see God’s face in the cloud of space gas when viewing a picture from a super telescope that can see all the way back to the beginning, or at least the silhouette of Abraham Lincoln. Now that’s something I’ve seen in the sky on many a summer day.

            But seriously, something that makes me doubt knowledge, or what appears to be knowledge, I believe that would do it. I haven’t the foggiest idea of what that might be, so I am no closer to finding faith than I was when I was ten years old, imagining that God is a scientist and we are his great experiment.

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Sunlight exposes the surface to eyes
Shows colors that lead me to believe in lies
Distracting my thoughts with superficial beauty
Misleading my heart from the Light I cannot see

Holy thoughts I cannot capture within
Escape on wings that flutter off in dark sin
Hide in the shadows of my invisible heart
When she visits me once more to tear it apart

Bats circle within my hallowed belfry
While echoes of long dead love ever haunt me
I am raising the sun to cast my demons out
Freeing my mind of all it's never been without

I'm told the Son has risen to free me
Of what burns my soul while trapped in this body
Daylight shines as the sun rises warming my flesh
Masking the star guiding my way to the crèche

Tell me the one truth, show me the right way
I want to release all doubts without delay
I want to not want, to be free of desire
To bask in the Son Light not bathe in the fire

Created On: 10/30/2003

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Touch

God please touch the world and heal it with your love
If I was you it's what I would do
Touch every child sick with a cold
Touch every young one born with defects
A nasty word to say they are less than the rest
Touch children born without love in their lives
Born without food and without hope
Touch them because I can't heal them
To lay your hands on all that is broken
All that is not pure in those too young to be impure
If I was you it's what I would do
Touch little Ro-Ro and make Autism vanish from the world
Touch all the boys and girls who cannot hear your voice
Who cannot see your light or understand your words
And even those who can, simply because they are innocent
Because they are simple and because they are yours
Heal every broken bone and every broken heart
Because someday they will be like me
Someday they will have given up
Given up hope, if they ever had any
Given up on love, knowing it will never come
If I could heal them I would give up my life
If I was you it's what I would do

Created On: 05/27/2002

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Information on purchasing this book can be found below the index.

Seeds & Weeds main page: Seeds & Weeds index (click link)

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 3: 3 Seeds ** (on main index page)

 4: 4th Independence

 5: Matthew 5:5

 6: Knot In The Loop

 7: Segregation *

 8: Separation *

 9: Where Will You Aim Your Hate?

10: NYS OCFS Graduation Speech, Parker Training Academy, 12/10/99 *

11: The Boyz At Tryon

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Chapter 2: Power & Peace (click Chapter Title for excerpts*)

Chapter 9: Loose Ends (click Chapter Title for excerpts*)

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