Reading:
Same time next year What! Eighty-five and still alive, A burden on the NHS? What next to do? Jump off a cliff And save the State a bob or two? Ah! But how can I assess What merit there might be In Death unless I know what happens Next? Omens are not good from what I see. Lactantius, Tertullian and that Angelic Doctor Each averred post mortem news was far from great. Then Dante came along to spell out fiendish punishments bespoke. Enough to make the strongest hesitate. Sin’s the fly in the celestial ointment it appears And not just Sin per se, though that is bad enough. While Adam’s Fall casts all into wickedness from birth Your chances turn on how you sin: reluctantly or with glee and mirth. Though each of us is born to lewdness and abomination Free Will gives us a choice, or so some say: sin joylessly Or indulge your vice with ‘gusto and determination’. Hellfire falls on those who picked the latter, thinking fun was free. ‘Sin’ for most means ‘sex’. Lust was what those Fathers feared. But who considers Last Things when they hope to score? No hope then to wash away the devilish sins of fornication. Rompings in the sty of Circe are the very thing the saints abhor! In Dante’s hell exclusive circles wait on those who’d savoured evil pleasures. Two floors down the weather’s awful. Force Twelve day and night blasts Those who kept their ‘little something on the side’. Further down it’s even worse. Fire; Ice; Torn by Harpies: exquisite Pains for those who relished Adam’s curse. To be one up on Sodomites and Simonists gives little consolation And no good deeds on earth can raise the randy up to join the Saved. One peccadillo and they’re screwed. For if it’s true what Fundamentalists believe Predestination dooms do-gooders equally with those who misbehaved. Indifferent to Virtue as to Vice, brute luck determines how and when we snuff it. Hobson’s choice our only choice while the body clock still ticks So I’ll take my pills from the local quack And hope to stay alive till eighty-six.
Peter Lloyd Jones 