[john savoie]

What exactly, or inexactly, does the last line mean or suggest?

[Janice D. Soderling]

Loved it, Ed.

[Terese Coe]

Well done, Ed, and I know this sort of poem needs more than mere wordplay, which you have provided. Though I too wonder about the last line. Meaning perhaps "g.d."...

Cheers and congrats!

[Richard Meyer]

Well, if the word God is missing the letter O, then we're left without a God, merely a G and a d, which could be taken as a metaphysical or theological observation: There is no god, just death; no happy hereafter, merely finality in the grave, so one may as well toast death instead of an imagined paradise to come. I suppose that's one way to read that last line.

Also, the O reverberates as an exclamation for me, as in O! or Oh! And that could suggest a variety of expressions: surprise, resignation, delight, or disbelief.

Richard

[Julie Steiner]

Doesn't it simply mean that the word "God" is, perhaps, already missing an O? Try putting it back in and see what happens.

[Don Jones]

Good question. Richard and Julie make valid points. "Gd" could also mean "God damn" - as in, "drink up for we are damned."

Added in: It would, on the other hand, be a mistake to assume that the poem means an English analog to the Tetragrammaton. Ed is going in the opposite direction of no God or God that damns.

[R. Nemo Hill]

I read it the way Julie did.

Nemo

[Gregory Palmerino]

Originally Posted by Richard Meyer

Well, if the word God is missing the letter O, then we're left without a God, merely a G and a d, which could be taken as a metaphysical or theological observation: There is no god, just death; no happy hereafter, merely finality in the grave, so one may as well toast death instead of an imagined paradise to come.

Gd pt, Richard. Maybe the O is not the letter, but the embodiment of the circle, i.e., everlasting life. Without the possibility of everlasting life, there's only death, as you said.

Greg

[Rick Mullin]

Excellent Ed.

[Richard Meyer]

Yes, of course. If g-o-d is missing an o, then god is not good. This is delightful wordplay.

Was it Schopenhauer who said if you replace Plato's the Good with God the result is Christianity?

Richard