The Last Idol

Value is a word that once ingested
Seeks to find a place to settle
Not unlike truth — it is a contaminant that
Scours the earth, soars in the skies
Creates heavens and hells
Looks inside and outside
To find a home, where it can rest
Where it can be attached

So that somehow
I — the self —
May continue
So that
What was never born, nor ever lived
What was an illusion, a dream
A ghost —
Somehow —
Might continue

Value — like truth —
Cannot be ascribed to the perceiver
Or the perceived
Nor even the process of perception
Nor in the totality of the whole
Not inside it — nor outside it
For if it could be fixed
If it were to be
It would forever become an ideal
The last idol

The only antidote to the contaminant
Called value or truth
Is purgation of the idea —
That such a thing exists
And ripping the very veil
Through which it appears to exist
Anywhere within or without

For if it were to be seen
If it could be named
It would forever be —
What this ghost will chase
Sanctify —
And commit every possible atrocity
In its name