The world is flat

The world is flat
The world is flat, the ancients once did say,
Devoid of form, whereby we might explore;
The sky so lofty, a mere pastel array,
Not to be touched, but viewed with futile longing.
From whence would come a path, a door,
An ether to traverse, an end to weary yawning?
But who would rise and speak to disagree
That only romanced fools thus aspire,
That this pilgrimage, in truth, may never be
A winding way to fabled, unseen heights?
Is then this road so low, so strewn with mire,
But an endless line of lonely days and nights?
The world is flat, stretching on and on,
Into the horizon, but never unto dawn.
©2006

This is a poem (in sonnet form) I wrote yesterday that expressess a very nihilistic outlook. When I began writing it, my only intention was to comment on the dullness or lack of exitement in my life which I felt at the moment; the sense of wondering whether my life on earth might ever involve some truly significant experience, or whether I am condemned to spend the rest of it enduring a monotony of days without new relationships or turns of the proverbial page.
However, the more noticable tone of the poem is philosophic despair; a natural desire for an afterlife which the speaker knows is only romantic, naive fantasy. I never have felt this way, and so I found it surprising how much this poem expressed just that viewpoint.
One might comment on the apparent truth of what is expressed here: life certainly does feel hopeless and meaningless sometimes, and the lack of immediate satisfaction to our desires often tempts us to think that the longings within us are never to be met.
Yet the facts speak otherwise. The world is not flat, niether in shape nor value. Our experiences as humans are by their very nature qualitative. We cannot help but ascribe meaning, importance and value to things that happen to us and the choices we make. The desires and longings we have as humans are themselves evidence of this value: the apparent absence of meaning in life that we sometimes experience could not exist but for the reality that life somehow ought to have meaning. In the naturalistic viewpoint, from whence nihilism is derived, all concepts of meaning and value, of good and bad, of pain and pleasure, are unfounded and absurd. Let our desire to find an ether to traverse lead us all to the only source of meaning and quality in life: the reality of infinate/imminant God, the truth given us in His word, and the reconciliation given to us in His son Jesus Christ.