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December 7, 2011 at 1:06 pm 
Kazim I was at Barnes & Noble with my son last night and made a surprising discovery: There’s a newly published book of poems by Shel Silverstein. It’s called Every Thing On It, and is apparently a post-mortem collection of poems he wrote between his 1996 book Falling Up and his death in 1999.
As a big fan since childhood, I read through several poems and found one which I really wanted to share. I took a picture of it so I could copy it later.
MASKS
(The picture on the page depicts two kids walking past each other, wearing VERY large masks that extend a long way above their heads.)
She had blue skin.
And so did he.
He kept it hid
And so did she.
They searched for blue
Their whole life through,
Then passed right by –
And never knew.
Immediately on reading the poem I thought, “Obviously, these are closeted atheists.”
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My interpretation was that is was a prophetic vision of the Na’vi in war paint.
I like yours better.
Dear Mr/mrs. Silverstein, Kazim etc
To promote skepticism/critical thinking I wrote some questions for the Christian believer. Are you able to put the link to these questions at your blog.
Thank you very much,
The original questions
http://www.freethinker.nl/forum/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=8382
The translation
http://www.freethinker.nl/forum/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=10033
The first one who did this, was Jonathan. This is a good example.
http://www.limbicnutrition.com/blog/tough-questions-for-believers/
By the way: The last part will be translated soon. Maybe you could recommend your readers to use google translate.
Regards,
Piet. (site admin freethinker Netherlands)
From a little pang of sadness I felt I conclude it’s about love. But then it’s that kind of poem.
For those who were wondering what the masks look like:
http://socialismartnature.tumblr.com/post/13807203032/photo-masks-by-shel-silverstein
And I disagree with the OP in one small respect: yes, they’re closeted, but I don’t see anything to suggest they’re atheists. They could be any unpopular minority. Well, maybe not gay, since the poem does call them “he” and “she”. I’ve met people who acted dumber than they were, in order to be popular among their peers.
How does that work? Do you put on shelves and he dresses up as a counter?
Who gets to be the Starbucks?
I don’t know if they are atheists but they are obviously smurfs!
Wait… Do smurfs ever go to church? Because… well maybe smurfs ARE atheists…
Okay… I have to go and write some atheist smurf fanfiction.
I think Dan Savage might have interpreted this poem a bit differently…
As usual our interpretation of a poem tells us as much about ourselves as it does about the poem.
I’m pretty much retarded about poems and dance, I’m never moved by them at all.
I’m glad to hear someone else say that for a change. I am the exact same way. I also find song lyrics make me feel retarded as well (even when I like the tune), so I tend to be swayed far more by instrumental music or lyrical music where I don’t know the language (I know — weird) and I can simply appreciate the human voice as simply another instrument. I always figured I was born without that part of the brain that can appreciate language from an aesthetic perspective….
I fully agree. I tend to like lyrics when they aren’t trying to take themselves too seriously, are made-up language, babble, foreign or just instrumental.
This poem is written in a way that the reader can interpret it the way he/she sees fit and it’s not wrong. This interpretation of it is just as valid as any.
It’s a great poem in that as some here have mentioned, it’s very open to interpretation by the reader. In Russell’s case, it could very well apply to the atheists he met in Florida who were so thrilled to talk to each other, because up until that time, they had each felt so isolated.
On a deeper level, I think a lot people go around “wearing masks” and hiding their true selves. It speaks of a quiet desperation that could so easily be lifted with just a little bit of courage.
Clearly this poem is about an alternate history for Mystique from X-Men.
I think it’s a noble attempt to prove that dinosaurs and humans didn’t coexist. It fails, but it fails well.
“The Giving Tree” is the greatest book ever written.
One’s for sure, we truly lost a genius in Shel Silverstein!
We often forget that there are atheist artists, and not lesser ones.
I don’t get it…how does that make them atheists?