A Thousand Words

It is impossible to the know —
Really and truly know —
The meaning of anything
I cannot even know the meaning
Of the word meaning
What does meaning really mean

I don’t even know the meaning of the word —
I
What does that really mean
I don’t know the meaning of the word
Know
What does knowing mean

And yet — paradoxically —
If I know the meaning of everything
That has just been said
How do I know

Perhaps
I do not know
I comprehend
I do not know that the cat sitting before me
Is a cat
I do not know
The cat

I assume that it is a cat
I assume that I know the cat —
To an extent, at least
And these assumptions are based on
The comprehension of the word
Cat

It is from that comprehension
That the assumption of knowledge follows

And that comprehension is a function
Not of the word
But of something that I am
At least — in fact, only —
When I am awake and alive
Not comatose or dead —
Is that comprehension possible

I must therefore be
A comprehension container

That associates
Sounds and perceptions
Placing the label, I
Upon the container

And says that I — know
What’s going into the container
What’s inside
Or what’s coming out

But —
These are all sounds and perceptions
Comprehended
Without comprehension
What can ever
Even be said
To be

In the end
And in the beginning
Of any attempt to understand
Or talk about knowledge, meaning
Or the world at all
I must therefore
Make an assumption

I must find
The root word
At least one singular sound —
That is attached to
The sense of comprehension —
The comprehension container

Through which
Any sound or perception
Is comprehended
And I call that I

And know —
Even before calling it I
Without even knowing the meaning of knowing —
Of its existence

What else can I know
Nothing whatsoever
Everything else that I ever know
Is predicated on this first knowing
And therefore
Never truly known
But is a comprehension
Of shared meaning
An assumption of knowledge
And belief

And even all that
Is based upon the first assumption
Where I attached one single sound
To comprehension
And had I not —
When I do not —
I cannot even know
That I exist

And therefore —
To speak, say, or utter any sound at all
To perceive anything at all
Is simultaneously an assumption, an expression
And the proof
Of the existence
Of the only thing, quality or fact
That can ever be said
To exist

I exist, I am, not because existence
Precedes perception or expression
I exist only as perception
Only as expression

To be is to be perceived —
Assumes that perceiver and the perceived
Exist apart from being
Whereas existence — being —
Exists only as far as
And as
Perception and perceived

To be is to be the entirety
Of the perceiver, perception, and the perceived
Without distinction —
Which is what
Language creates
And has the capacity
To obliterate

As an individual
Consciousness or comprehension
When I say that I exist
What I am really saying is that
Existence exists
Which can only be said
Because what I call the world
Exists
And is perceived

I do not know that I exist
Because of thinking
Or due to perceiving
I cannot know that I exist
Apart from thinking
Without perceiving

The individual, man or cat
Is an instrument
Through which expression happens
And in case of man, at least
The instrument assumes
That it is the seat of comprehension

And contains the container
That either sits apart from
Or is the contained — the world
Whereas it and the world
Exist only as far as
And as, the other

And when the expression ceases
When the instrument dissolves
So does the individual —
But never existence
Nor the world

Correctly viewed, then —
The entirety of the world of man
From birth till death
is like a bubble
In which a consciousness assumes residence
Seeing itself apart from the world
Seen through the bubble

Whereas
Only it —
the bubble — the man —
Is not
Whatever is
Is what it is not

That Thou Art —
Is a statement made by consciousness — the Thou —
Looking out from inside the bubble
And knowing what is seen to be itself
Declaring unity

But no perspective exists
To express what exists
Without the boundary of the bubble —
Without the ephemeral instrument

The only truth then —
If any truth can be said at all —
Must be that
Neither Thou nor That
Exist

The positing of life as dream
Can only take place from the perspective
Of the individual dreamer
Looking out through the skin
Seeing itself and what’s looked at — the world —
Inexorably dissolve and disappear
But no dreamer
Within or without
Can be said to exist

And waking up from the dream
Can be nothing
But death

And all talks of waking up
Within the dream
Of recognising the unity
Of dreamer — the Thou —
And the dreamt — the That —
Are but attempts of the instrument —
The individual consciousness
At attaining immortality

Forgetting that mortality itself
Is the first assumption —
I exist

And
If the instrument is through which
These sounds and words
Take shape
And comprehension is upon which
They fall and impinge
Then —
From which they come
To which they belong
And what they truly are
Must be
What is —

Forever unable
And only ever able —
To comprehend itself
Through sound
Through form

While the instrument
The individual consciousness — the bubble —
Remains in infinity
Willing, choosing — or relinquishing, surrendering —
Its course
Bringing into birth
Space
And time

Knowing the sound, word and perceived
To be itself
And assuming
It to be another

Communication thus —
Is the falsest
Of assumptions

And falser even
Is the assumption
That these are sounds and words
Are comprehension
At all

And yet —
The pen can’t be blamed
Nor can the bubble
Or the word

Only the form turning
Upon itself
To consume
The form

Naming it
Self enquiry
Or genocide