Men thought Excluded Middle
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n those old days they thought so when he foughtFor lofty things, a youthful radicalCome here to change the world! But now at lastHe lectures in back halls to youths who areWhat he was in his youth, to acid soulsWho must have bitterness, can take enoughTo kill a healthy soul, as fiends for dopeMust have enough to kill a body clean.And so upon a night Excluded MiddleIs lecturing to prove that life is evil,Not worth the living--when his auditorsBehold him pale and sway and take his seat,And later quit the hall, the lecture leftHalf finished. This had happened in a twinkling:He had made life a punching bag, with fists,Excluded Middle and Reductio,Had whacked it back and forth. But just as oftenAs he had struck it with an argumentThat it is not worth living, snap, the bagWould fly back for another punch. For lifeJust like a punching bag will stand your whacksOf hatred and denial, let you punchAlmost at will. But sometime, like the bag,The strap gives way, the bag flies up and fallsAnd lies upon the floor, you've knocked it out.And this is what Excluded Middle doesThis night, the strap breaks with his blows. He provesHis strength, his case and for the first he seesLife is not worth the living. Life gives up,Resists no more, flys back no more to him,But hits the ceiling, snap the strap gives way!The bag falls to the floor, and lies there still--Who now shall pick it up, re-fasten it?And so his color fades, it well may beThe crisis of a long neurosis, wellWhat caused it? But his eyes are wondrous clearPerceiving life knocked out. His heart is sick,He takes his seat, admiring friends swarm round him,Conduct him to a carriage, he goes homeAnd sitting by the fire (O what is fire?The miracle of fire dawns on his thought,Fire has been near him all these years unseen,How wonderful is fire!) which warms and soothesNeuritic pains, he takes the rubber caseWhich locks the images of father, mother.And as he stares upon the oval brow,The eyes of blue which flash the light of faith,Preserved like dendrites in this silver shimmer,Some spectral speculations fill his brain,Float like a storm above the sorry wreckOf all his logic tools, machines; for nowSince pains in back and shoulder like to father'sFall to him at the age that father had them,Father has entered him, has settled downTo live with him with those neuritic pangs.Thus are his speculations. Over allHow comes it that a sudden feel of life,Its wonder, terror, beauty is like father's?As if the soul of father entered in himAnd made the field of consciousness his own,Emotions, powers of thought his instruments.That is a horrible atavism, whenYou find yourself reverting to a soulYou have not loved, despite yourself becomingThat other soul, and with an out-worn selfCrying for burial on your hands, a lifeNot yours till now that waits your new found powers--Live now or die indeed!
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