You Are the Strong Ones

You are the strong ones,
you, who refuse to sit idly by,
who refuse to learn without questioning
fact and teacher alike,
who refuse blind faith
and prescribed worship,
and yet are at peace with the fact
that some things
are not to be understood.

You are the strong ones,
you, who see beauty everywhere,
not because of words in a poem or a book
but because it is simply there
in the faces,
in the flowers,
in the love, and
in the suffering.

You are the burdened,
you, who see the sorrow
of the world
and feel it fully,
toll paid to be counted among
the truly alive.

In the end
your views will die with you,
your perspective irrelevant,
your spirit a hazy concept,
nothing with you
but the sum of your nows.

And if, in this end, you are fortunate,
you will have spent your time
among the also-alive,
among the also-engaged,
among the also-aware,
through joy and through pain,
knowing that you have consumed
all that there is.