Saturday, February 23, 2008

Its folds and valleys

didn't evolve in order for you
to comprehend the Ultimate Truth.
Its multitudinous, spindly little branches
aren't there so you can contemplate
the whole Universe and embrace it
in your grasp.
Its contentious family doesn't exist to prop up
your philosophy
or your gods.
And most of all, it didn't become what it did
in order for you to figure out
all the tricks it pulls
when you're not looking
and the hocus-pocus it performs when you are.
It's there to help you figure out
how to get enough to eat
and how to find allies to protect yourself
and how to kill anything that threatens you
and how to convey a part of that continuous
river running through your head
to others.
And it does all this
so you can survive long enough
to find someone to screw regularly
so that others like you can come into existence.
It's a jerry-rigged, jumbled up collection of
parts that proved useful, and nothing more.
It's a shack surrounded by a house encased in a mansion,
and you live in all three.
So stop expecting it to make you Happy,
and stop your absurd game of telling yourself
that you've Figured It All Out, and most of all
stop your village idiot proclamations of Certainty.
All the noble aspirations it's given you
are an afterthought,
and the more you try to figure out the gifts it gave you
using the gifts themselves,
the more you will become Alice
falling down the rabbit hole.

3 comments:

Daedalusx007 said...

I'd like to think thats it can be more tahn just a tool of survival, I'd like to think that with care and respect we can use our minds to help us build better futures for the "more of us" that we create.

Or maybe I'm just being really optimistic, which for me is grossly out of character.

Joseph Miller said...

It can be done. But it will be slow and difficult--and our primal needs will continue to demand priority.

Daedalusx007 said...

I've always found the balance is both important and hard to maintain.