11-23-2023, 05:30 AM
Cave Magic
The thing about cave paintings
is not how good they are
(you know how it goes
the first time you try something
and it works,
it’s always fabulous)
but that somebody noticed
reality could be reduced
to what was seen
and reproduced: an aurochs,
wooly rhino, hunters
(those last only stick figures
lest their souls be stolen).
From there it’s such a short step
to symbols and enumeration
but to Plato
there’s no step at all:
come spring the painter
creeping up to light and all dimensions
from near-hibernation
ran back in and told his tribe
the miracle had happened
once again. But unlike Plato’s
not being chained within
they followed him outside
reborn.
The thing about cave paintings
is not how good they are
(you know how it goes
the first time you try something
and it works,
it’s always fabulous)
but that somebody noticed
reality could be reduced
to what was seen
and reproduced: an aurochs,
wooly rhino, hunters
(those last only stick figures
lest their souls be stolen).
From there it’s such a short step
to symbols and enumeration
but to Plato
there’s no step at all:
come spring the painter
creeping up to light and all dimensions
from near-hibernation
ran back in and told his tribe
the miracle had happened
once again. But unlike Plato’s
not being chained within
they followed him outside
reborn.
Non-practicing atheist