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Matador

by John W. Steele


The words I write will survive after I’m gone
Such a pity
What may have been perceived as comprehension
Offered little more than rationalization
Like bubbles rising from the floor
Of an abysmal ocean
To burst at the surface
Thus extinct

I ponder the past and ask
What fool would consider such folly
Yet when the ink flowed blue as blood
On the parchment
The words gave testament to my world

Beyond good and evil
Like and dislike
Mind does not exist
All that remains
Are nebulous conceptual possibilities
Bound by three-dimensional circumstance
Like quantum particles
Locked dormant and inert
Deep in the core
Of an atom

At the gates of awareness
Stands a terrifying Guardian
This monster decides
What can enter mind
And what must be excluded
Thoughts that placate the demon angel
Pass through the gateless barrier
Transmuted to mind energy

The Guardian holds the saber of reality
To slay the Guardian
One must transcend
Both thought and circumstance

And there he is again
The matador
Twirling the magenta muleta
To fell the holy beast

The ancients believed
Thought is a disease of mind
This is easy to see
But difficult to fathom
The words I write will survive after I’m gone
Perhaps it’s time to take up golf


Copyright © 2011 by John W. Steele

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