God!
God!
the character-building poem for one reader, NOW with 4,897,760,256 possible deities!
You will need a coin, a six-sided die, pen/pencil, and paper. If you believe that humans have free will, you may forego the required materials and decide for yourself who you want to be.
#1 Roll a die once to determine whether you are a good (1-2), evil (3-4), or mysterious (5-6) deity. Roll again to determine if you will be just (1-2), merciful (3-4), or mysterious (5-6).
#2 Flip a coin to determine your godly gender:
- If the coin comes up heads, your followers see you as a feminine figure.
- If the coin comes up tails, your followers see you as a masculine figure.
- If the coin lands on its side, rolls under a heavy piece of furniture, or is stolen away by a curious bird, you transcend human gender norms. [1]
#3 How do you appear to humans?
- Humanoid
- Animal
- Technology
- Nature
- Ethereal
- I do not mingle with the lesser forms of existence
#4 Were you to make intelligent life, you would do so:
- for them to worship you
- for them to love you
- for them to fear you
- for them to doubt you exist
- for them to never even consider the fact that you might exist
- to show that you can make life
#5 What will you require from your followers:
- Cutting, burning, piercing, inking, and destroying their body to show dedication
- Refraining from cutting their hair
- The utter annihilation of non-believers
- Suicide with my name on their lips
- Human sacrifice: only virgins will do, split them down the middle, the blood collected in a night-dark trough, the solid remains dried to jerky for the priests to nibble on.
- Think of me occasionally, if you have the time
#6 How will you and your followers communicate with each other?
- You will never make your presence known, they must believe
- A large, very repetitive book cobbled together by hundreds of writers and thinkers over several thousand years.
- Words on the wall (e.g., Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin)
- Thunder.
- You will inhabit each of your followers so that when they speak to one another, they will hear you, speak to you, love you
- Morse code (just as soon as someone invents it)
#7 Who will be your beloved?
- The clean, spotless, pure
- The fools
- The proletariats
- The faithful
- The less fortunate
- I will love no being
- The rich, the powerful
#8 Your people will abstain from consuming:
- Blood
- Products of a capitalist system
- Alcohol
- Each other
- Leavened bread
- Hand stuff
#9 Your idols will be made of:
- Soft gold
- BPA-free plastic
- sun-warmed stone
- bleached bones
- blood diamonds
- nothingness
#10 Your universe shall:
- end in destruction
- end cold, desolate
- end as a collapsing mass
- exist in your mind alone
- exist on the back of a pillbug
- exist forever
#11 For your followers, death means:
- The end
- The beginning
- An illusion
- A helluva ride
- Le grande morte
- A small man in a top hat, beckoning with one crooked finger, pulling you towards a waiting room complete with fluorescent lights, hotel carpeting, and Fleetwood Mac on loop
#12 Your afterlife is most like:
- Sex (1-2)
- Drugs (3-4)
- Rock and Roll (5-6)
#13 You should be worshipped:
- in a field
- in a chain coffee shop
- by oneself, in near-darkness
- in a soup kitchen
- on a rooftop, feet dangling
- in all of these places
#14 If your people do not believe in you, then:
- I'll banish them for eternity
- I'll love them regardless
- I'll reveal myself on burnt toast
- I won't believe in them
- I'll try again
- I won't give a shit
_______________
[1] See also, Butler's Gender Trouble
