Do You Still Believe In Santa Claus?

by Board Member Art Roscoe

Do you still believe in Santa Claus
    Though perhaps with lingering doubts?
Have you questioned your religion
    What it's dogma's all about?

What mysteries lie in the cosmos,
    In their vastness of time and space?
Though our earthbound bodies are limited,
    Do our spirits stay rooted to place?

Philosophers have pondered these
    And angels on a pin
While scientists have offered proof
    When asked "How'd it all begin?"

And through all the great confusion
    That these questions seem to bring
Great Shamans smile and pen their verse
    For the Universe to sing;

For as they and all Wise Women know
    True wisdom don't come cheap.
A man must put his past behind
    And let his ego sleep;

And only then is he prepared
    To plumb soul's deep dark ways,
And given time, his eye may clear
    To see beyond the haze,

To view the gift that only he
    Can give to all the rest,
The thing that transcends Christmas
    And trumps all religions' tests.

So he now returns with confidence
    To step into the world
And finds mostly adolescents
    In their fetal crouches curled.

But lest we all abandon hope
    Shouting "Bring on the sixth extinction!"
The "found souls" grow in strength each day
    And serve all with great distinction.

So don't give up on Santa Claus
    In his bright red shaman clothes;
The metaphor remains intact
    As up through the smoke hole he goes.