Cotton Clouds


We don't want to make the gods sad, 
But for the sake of the green earth 
We need to give them headaches.  

Headaches?  Why would the gods need headaches?  

Once upon a time there was no such thing as rain, 
And the world was all dry and brown. 
But then one god got a headache
And took pills to relieve it.  
He threw the cotton from the pill bottle
Away into our sky
Where it became a rain cloud.  

With the rain came green growing things
But they didn't last. 
After a while they withered back to brown
Until the next time some god got a headache 
And threw his pill-bottle cotton
Into our sky to make more clouds.  

When the gods decided they needed to have headaches more often
To keep the world green 
They created humanity.  

Our job is to do strange quirky amusing things
To get them thinking and wondering and laughing so hard
That they get constant headaches
And have to keep tossing pill-bottle cotton
To make rain clouds to keep the world green.  

But we have to be careful. 
If we go beyond the strange and quirky 
Into the truly hurtful
Like wars and murderous cruelty and taking evil advantage of others
It makes the gods sad
And they won't want to watch our strange amusing antics
And won't get headaches
And won't throw away pill-bottle cotton 
And the world will again be all dry and brown.  



                                   -- Tom Digby
                                   First draft 17:30 04/15/2003
                                   Entered     13:34 04/18/2003
                                   Revised     13:54 04/30/2003
                                   Revised     02:12 05/01/2003