What Do I Know

What do I know: 

but what do I know? Is there anything that I hold as certain? The truth is that I take much for granted, assumptions made of all beyond this present moment. There is so little that I really know, and even less that demands my attention to function in the world. My body has it's own way of knowing, perfectly fine without my conscious will to draw breath,  or cause my heart to beat, or any of the infinite vital assignments it performs completely on its own. Even my mind belongs to this system, working fine in the order it provides, without need of my assistance. 

it seems my personal world works fine without me. 

and so much information is simply handed to me, read from books, gathered from media, or inherited from teachers, parents, and clergy. This is not my true knowledge, although my life works well within these guidelines. None of this is what I truly know. 

science says the hard problem of consciousness is explaining why we have experiences, how the world becomes personal to us, meaningful. I keep things easy, with no questions that demand an immediate answer, without need to know anything as certain. Poetry doesn't have to ask the hard questions, nor does my happiness depend on answers. Consciousness has given me an entire world to explore, infinite in its direction. For me - the questions lead to something beautiful in their ultimate mystery, unknowable, but somehow too imparting something to be known. The irony is that words will always fail to capture this, only winking at the jest of its own attempt and effort. 

but what do I know? 

the question stays - what I know is this, and it's indescribable, fragile, and completely my own. It's my very own moment, an experience of self inter-dependent on the worlds existence, as well as the emptiness that allows my world to rise. I know this moment in my own way, not in any ultimate sense of being true, not as an illusion to be seen through, but to be cherished, to be grateful that I exist at all with a world so full and varied to its beauty. 

~

Peace, Eric