LIES

I

When you were young
lies kept the dream of sex
alive, and when sex ceased to be
a dream, the liar in you replaced it
with love.
Coversation at parties
owes everything to lies, but conversation
between friends owes more. It is the same
even in an open boat.
On the way home from Bible
class you saw in the bus mirror
your best friend steal the rat-tail comb
from your back pocket
and when he convinced you
he had done no such thing,
you knew you had witnessed a miracle.

Dante reserves the deepest level
of hell for suicides and liars because
they refuse to accept life
as it is.
Othello would be nobody
without Iago. Your first lover was a liar.
For a time we admired the teachers who didn't
lie, but later we hated them for it.
Christ interests us more
if we imagine him a liar. Some think
it is tools, others hindsight, but really
it is the lie which sets us apart
from animals.


II

Whatever is easy is good.

When children first discover lying,
parents say faith is impossible. Shouldn't
they thank their sons and daughters
for such wisdom?
We can always recognize people
who aren't liars because they stand out.
They have lost the art of camouflage
and will probably die soon.
Your present lover is a liar, too,
only a better one. What good is the Tree of Life
without the Tree of Knowledge?
God forgives
everything because he's lied to us
from the beginning.
We say sinners lie
to others and moralists to themselves.
What we mean is everybody
lies.
Adultery is not the same
as lying. It is telling the truth
no one wants to hear.
We never forget how to lie.
It's like swimming or breathing,
a survival skill.
Miranda is redeemed because she learns
how to lie. Lady Macbeth goes mad
because she forgets.

I will not speak of the poets.


III

We are relieved
to be caught in a lie, joyous to discover one.
Such pleasure cannot be wrong.
All art is a lie and history
has shown we will pay anything
for it. The people we lie to
are the ones we really love.
On the stage one can perform
a lie and be honoured for it. On the battlefield
one can live a lie and be killed for it.
The reverse is also true.
Who is the better actor?
A philosopher writes of a rich man:
after a long absence he returns
in disguise to his home town
only to be killed
by his own mother
who doesn't recognize him.
There is no better irony
than the irony
generated by a lie.
Do not despair. Anyone who believes
in something can lie. There is the gift
and the wrapping. Which is which?
Paradox is a lie in its Sunday best.

Last week at a high school reunion
I heard a voice telling me to confess,
but when I opened my mouth, my friends
only laughed and brought me more wine.
This is certain: if you have loved,
you have lied. If you have lied
to me, I am grateful.
Not everyone is lucky enough
to be saved
from the truth.

-Terence Young, The Island in Winter

from frances