The Question (2)

You should wish to have a hundred thousand sets

of mothwings, so you could burn them away, one set a night.

The moth sees light and goes into fire. You should see fire

and go to the light. Fire is what of God is world-consuming.

Water, world-protecting.

Somehow each gives the appearance of the other.

To these eyes you have now, what looks like water burns.

What looks like fire is a great relief to be inside.

You have seen a magician make a bowl of rice

seem a dish of tiny, live worms. Before an assembly, with one

breath he made the floor swarm with scropions

that were not there. How much more amazing God's tricks.

Generation after generation lies down defeated, they think,

but they are like a woman underneath a man, circling him.

One molecule-mote-second of considering

this reversal of comfort and pain

is better than any attending ritual.

That splinter of intelligence is substance.

The fire and water themselves?

Accidental, done with mirrors.