Ship of Fools

Any fool can make a rule, and any fool will mind it. - Thoreau

Ship of Fools, oil on wood painting

by Hieronymus Bosch, c. 1490-1500

here then gone in but a blink

with a gnarled nod and a warped wink

we're all idiots

stowaways on a misguided ship of fools

not realizing that what we think we're winning is really causing us to lose

playing an ill-conceived game with our own contorted rules

we've been granted freewill to choose

'tween a fountain of life and cheap, haughty, bad booze

prisoners of reason

captives of rhyme

a meaningless, double-jointed mime

a noiseless, windless chime

pillars of parting cloud and doused fire sublime

buried souls without the lime

not just now and then

but for an eternity of time

Author's Note

"By a seeming fate, commonly called necessity, they are employed, as it says in an old book, laying up treasures which moth and rust will corrupt and thieves break through and steal. It is a fool's life, as they will find when they get to the end of it, if not before.” - Thoreau

Reviews

[Betty Hermelee]

To me a fool’s life is sometimes by choice and other times by necessity… meaning that we can live in a society where there is no truth, just lies,…. And in that we have no choices, one rules…. Or one in which fools rule, and that my friend is what creates fear in many of us….
( just my interpretation….). nice write Pete
Warmly, B

[Poetess]

This poem is profound and makes one contemplate their existence. “A noiseless, windless chime” stood out to me. This is great work.

[Pete]

thank you for the thoughtful share poetess ... :)

"Not till we are lost, in other words not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations." - thoreau

[emmajoygreen]

Life is misinterpreted by those who think they know how and how much - when, in fact they know only what they know rather than truth's true validity!! Perhaps.

[Pete]

indeed dearest em ... and you had to know that something like this was coming ...

“To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.” - Thoreau

[emmajoygreen]

Maybe from somewhere I recalled that quote, Pete? Pause. Without overthinking am apt to think that what we know comes from past experience and - how we use it.

[Pete]

... you are not alone in thinking that. thoreau also said, "I should say that the useful results of science had accumulated, but that there had been no accumulation of knowledge, strictly speaking, for posterity; for knowledge is to be acquired only by a corresponding experience. How can we know what we are told merely? Each man can interpret another's experience only by his own." ... :)

[Thomas W Case]

Brilliant work, Pete. Truly sublime.

[Pete]

thank you thomas. be careful of what ships you board ... :)

[Poetic Beauty]

Many time we waste time and energy on trivial things that have little meaning in the end.

[Pete]

don't you just know it, as if we can take it with us when we check out ... :)

[Poetic Beauty]

That we can not but our penned words will last long after we have finished our time on this plane and move onto the next

[Patricia Wedel]

dear Pete... my treasures are not to keep... others may weep when there is no Gold. The Storms at Sea become our Destiny. Thoreau was a Survivor and left Words to Live by. gently, Pat

[Pete]

one man's riches are another's rags and one man's rags are another's riches ... :)