THIS NIGHT ON OUR
DOMESTIC SCREEN
In many respects the human capacity for
complex thought is a wonderful faculty that enables us to make sense
of our experiences of the universe. However, it can also lead to a
certain blindness, especially when ideas that are convenient in
certain respects are taken as some sort of reality.
For instance, maps of all sorts are
convenient but many of the things on maps like the lines for borders
between countries don't actually exit except in people's minds.
Politics and economics are two areas where ideas are often mistaken
for reality and truth is a rare commodity.
THIS NIGHT
ON OUR DOMESTIC SCREEN
This night on our domestic screen
a simulacrum of a man
sheds withered, drifting words upon
politic policy. They seem
like drying leaves on desert wind.
For years I have been exiled from
prosperity or even pay.
And faith grows thin.
I step outside. The air
is clear and cool in summer darkness.
Here, far from urban glare,
galactic opalescence sheens
the scattered silver of the stars.
Our minds make maps. See over there
are five, bright stars... how hard it is to see
those five, bright suns and not the mental bars
we call the southern cross.
The constellations have real stars but not
the arbitrary lines of mind's convenient gestalt.
And nations have real people not
percentages and abstract, common aims.
Dry words from dry souls hungering for fame
these are
less real than lines
from star to star.
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