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371 In Hospital Now I know that life Is much more important than I had imagined. God is not omnipotent! He has not been able to create life Easy to let go or to come by, He has not been able to make healing Grow beautifully out of the stroke of injury, Nor Life giving life except to the rhythm of anguish; He is not omnipotent. Even to those who have life thrust upon them He has not been able to convey the meaning of his invention, He has not certainly made it known if life is immortal. What does it matter then, about the count of the stars Or the shape of the Universe, Or that a man might fly past Betelguese At a hundred miles an hour for a million years? Life is important, because it costs so much, Wherein we are admitted to secret sharing Of God’s incompetence, His last, least perfected adventure. What does it matter that time goes chuckling in the dark At the joke of eternity? It may be the man-soul will laugh Out besting his creator, Subduing the pain of birth and the anguish of dissolution, It may be that I shall discover The uninvented trick of immortality. Editor’s Notes AU 234; two drafts, with little correction. ...

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