  I am lying here in bed asking myself the question "Why?" . Perhaps, of the five categories of questions, Who, What, When, How and Why, the last is most queried. I don't know if anyone has ever bothered to make a study of it to find out the reason or what the benefit would be in doing so. I know when I had been asked to enough times, I put together a collection of poems and prose written when I was working with severely abused youngsters, that I entitled it, "Tell Us The Reason Why". ( I wonder why?) When tragedy occurs, sudden death robs a person of a loved one, war snatches sons and daughters, husbands and wives fom their families, houses burn down, businesses go bankrupt, the rich and famous commit suicide, abuse kills thousands upon thousands of children every year, planes crash, trains derail, famine starves whole nations, pollution kills off fish and wildlife, people are murdered, raped, tortured and robbed - and rising in peaked crescendo from agonized grief, from homicidal rage, from stunned, bewildered disbelief, from hearts and lips and staggered souls - the question bugles - WHY? Why me ? Why us ? Why now ? Why did God do this, allow this? Why couldn't it be me, not my boy, my little girl, my husband, my wife? Why ? Why? Why? Is this question really the one to ask? Do we get a satisfactory answer from the asking ? Seems to me that only more questions arise from asking WHY, not the least being that blame is laid at God's feet, if one believes in God, perhaps because it is simpler to accord a reason to a Deity who cannot answer in an audible response and this avoids hearing a solution and an answer one might not wish to hear. Death is not necessarily in God's hands. Millions commit suicide and who wants to ask themselves if they had any part in contributing to the desperate act, or when drug overdose suddenly removes a life, whose act is that? Man goes to war to make peace, to have control, to possess more land - where is God in these ambitions? Does God throw the glowing cigarette butt on the carpet by mistake, or cause an electrical short ,or leave the burner on, or make the wood scatter sparks catching a curtain and setting it alight, burning down a house? Is arson of God or man? The inhumanity of MAN, not God plays itself out in the debasing of children in pornography, prostitution, ritualistic abuse, domestic violence and lives are snuffed out in the most hideous of ways. Is it God who flies the plane, drives the train, creates a famine and trifles with the air that once was pure and now contaminated? Is God in Spirit ( for He has no physical form), able to rape, murder, torture and rob? So why ask GOD WHY? I am wondering why now, when I need to be on my feet and ready to move at any time, I am laid low, and not only low, am I so sick and wondering if I will stay horizontal permanently ? But I am not asking God for answers. I do know that the reason will become clear at some point - the question more relevant to my situation, is for me - not Why, but WHAT ? What is the lesson I need to learn here? What is it I need to do if I don't make it - for I do not feel prepared to die in the sense that I need to exmine what unfinished business is yet to be reviewed and dealt with. What would be the point of staying alive when passing over from this earthly struggle looks so inviting? What is more important about living than dying ? If I can answer the Whats, the only reason Why would come into the picture would be because someone else is asking - not me.   | LEGACY OF THE UNBELOVED | CRUMBS FOR THE STARVING | DISINFECTION | BEAUTY | WHY and WHAT | Would You Still Be My friend ? | THE BOTTLE | ROSES and THISTLES | | THE HEALING PROCESS | DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER | POETRY | Biographical Entries | |
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