Explanation

A couple comments/notes of explanation on the two posted poems.

The first I heard on NPR and found it rather amusing, and a bit convicting. The attitude of the little boy who made the lanyard is very similar to all of us at times -- we have been given so much by various people: friends, parents, grandparents, and of course, God. Yet we easily take these things for granted and believe that some simple act will pay back all that we've been given. "Look God, I've been such a good little girl, praying, reading my Bible, and I even gave my brother the bigger cookie. I know you saved me from death and damnation, and now I think we're pretty even."

The second, while I don't really agree with philosophically, I do like, mostly because it was made into a song that I sang in choir my senior year. That was also the year my family went to Israel, specifically while I was learning that song. I remember sitting by the Sea of Galilee at night, on the east side, with that song stuck in my head, looking over at the lights of Tiberias "along the shore." I may not have been there before, but I do certainly want to go back now!