God Is Not Religion

They’ve spun your name all of my life,
Reeling me in with scriptural hooks,
Yet I only really knew your worth
Outside the fables inside their books.

Preachers condemned everything I was,
Then cleansed me with crocodile tears.
But I saw you as more than a strongarm thug
Or sum of my greatest fears.

They told me how you died for my sins,
But never said why I came to be.
Everything I read was stipulation
Of hypocrites living hypocrisy.

They commanded my lips to lift your name
From righteous words of their mouth,
Then turned around to ravage free will
When I saw their actions turning south.

I’ve walked enough with evil to know
Truth has nothing to do with creeds.
No one can preach unconditional love
Then browbeat God with hellish deeds.

How many bastards have altered boys
Under guises of loving hands?
How many lives have shattered thus
In disguise of a fool's demands?

In the end there is religiosity
Between faith and matter of fact.
It hovers around a hell-beaten realm,
Failing to keep you intact.

I know in my heart your essence is real,
I know, too, that their lies are not.
So I seek my heaven apart from religion
In light of all that I’ve sought.