The QWERTY Parable

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The QWERTY Parable

The Spirit comes, some days in wind, some days in breeze;
Sometimes (still air) I sit, staring at the keys.

This great device, of low things made, of rather lower make;
Its plain outside hides a profound, etched, sandy flake.

From "Esc" (Escape) to "Enter," "SHIFT" and "ALT" are there,
The twenty-seven common keys, numbers and more rare;

Function keys - their use arranged by programs planned;
Quotes and brackets, slashes and the famous ampersand.

In classroom, home and factory and lab
The fingers pound the backspace and the tab.

Newfangled like the horseless carriage, now a car
The QWERTY board spread high-tech near and far.

These keys - a shovel, plow, or broom - tool of the mind -
But then like a new asterisk a strange key I did find.

A parable, a mystic sign well-recognized and known,
A horrid death One died for all, stark and alone.

The math of Genesis Tom Jefferson did quote[1];
The Spirit pouring out on Greeks the Jews did note[2].

The human family, varied, vast, no two the same;
On that hill of pain was seen through but one frame:

For us a key was bought - Death defeated[3] by Life's loss;
The key of Calvary: we're equal beneath the cross.

(April 21, 1995)

Notes:

[1] "We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal"
[2] See Acts 10:45: "Jewish believers who had accompanied Peter were all astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit should be poured out on the pagans too."
[3] "The cross cannot be defeated, for it is Defeat." G.K. Chesterton, The Ball and the Cross, 207

(Yes, people have already complained about my putting footnotes in poetry!)