The Man With The Eyes Of God Poem by David Lewis Paget

I met him first in a darkened room
Of the Club called Heaven’s Lair,
You wouldn’t look at him twice, in fact
You’d swear that he wasn’t there,
He’d sunk right into a corner lounge
And you’d think it rather odd,
He sat there facing the wall, and stared,
The Man with the Eyes of God.

I’d drank at the bar a dozen times
But I’d never seen him round,
A patron pointed him out to me
His lips not making a sound,
He turned a beer mat over, then
He nudged, and gave me the nod,
Scribbled a note that said, ‘That’s him!
The Man with the Eyes of God.’

I smirked, and carried my drink across
Though the patron said, ‘Beware! ’
Approached the back of the lounge to see
When the man just said, ‘Stop there!
Don’t venture into my vision, or
You will see what you should not,
Your blood will curdle within your veins
And your heart will surely stop.’

I stopped, and sat to the rear of him
Behind, and off to his right,
‘They tell me you have a precious gift
To do with the Maker’s sight.’
‘It’s not a gift, it’s a curse, ’ he said
‘That I’ve laboured with for years,
For God sent me for your history,
And lent me his eyes and ears.’

‘He wanted to know what you had done
Since he last went past this way,
And scattered the Tower of Babel by
Confusing your tongues that day,
He hadn’t wanted to interfere
For he gave you all free will,
So sent me as his emissary
To report both good and ill.’

‘And what have you told almighty God,
The truth, or a pack of lies? ’
‘I haven’t needed to tell, he sees
The truth through both of his eyes,
I feel the sense of his discontent
At you breaking all his laws,
Polluting his beautiful planet
With the scourge of your endless wars.’

‘So what does he plan to do with us, ’
I whispered there in the gloom,
‘Does he plan to come and punish us,
Will our God be calling soon? ’
‘His spirit has always been right here,
It’s embedded in the earth,
In every tree and the mighty sea
In rain, and the gift of birth.’

‘You’ll feel the wrath of his discontent
In a thousand days of drought,
In ice that clings to your window-sills
In floods that you can’t keep out, ’
He turned his head and he looked at me
And I cringed at his vacant nod,
For blood lay thick on each cheek, where he
Had put out the Eyes of God!

17 February 2014