359 and 360

To love the Question Mark—that is a cause

I’d love to rally ‘neath the banner of.

To love the ‘I know not’, and the ‘what was…’,

and everything that comes away thereof.

I think that everyone that ever learned

is patron to that cause—the Question Mark.

No joy in knowledge has ever been earned

without a journey wandering its dark.

So I will learn its tenets and its creeds,

and find its form appending every word;

and all the variations of my deeds

will wear its vestments, and its interests gird.

Thus curiosity will govern me,

and I shall live by Question Mark’s decree.

~~~

1 Nephi 2: 7:

Before I stopped for food, I stooped for stones—

the brightest ones about the riverbed—

and carried them by arms of agèd bones

and started to stack, organize, and spread.

Now three days far from home we had all come,

by naught but my own word we made our leave.

I cannot blame my boldly bothered son

when he, too, witnesses his mother grieve.

But, bolder, is his brother, who is proud—

too arrogant in his old father’s dream.

He knows not how, quite soon, I will be bowed

before the earth, as passing as this stream.

The altar of these stones is nearly done,

and I must pray for courage for my son.