The Fool's Discontent, Part 2

Seven parts. The seventh part is best. The rest? Well, let's just say it essentially works as a multi-way comment on a certain subject. The subject? If it doesn't become clear then it's probably not relevant to you...

read Part I first


II.

In the high-arched entry of the guarded house
Stand fruits of thought, of history
The magic smell of faded mystery
enchants the pure clean figures all in rows:
Artifacts of kings and sages
Ideas of the ages,
Borne on the leaves
Of countless books
And ghostly shades
Of a thousand faces –

But what a curious condition:
Some faces bright, the remnant hidden
For light streams from the inner halls!
The lens of Then and Now Especially
Bends the light in beams directly
On a few of these wise faces
And peeking from the shadowed places
The rest all stifle scornful smiles
Your eyes adjust – you now beguiled
Feeling like a foster child
Scorned by hidden ancestry

  Is this meant to be?

“Too vaguely formed this question!”; thus
Your smiling guide replies:
“Oh surely you could not expect
A room awash in untrained light!
Those who strive to see it straight
The residents who bear the weight
They work so hard to aim this light
Time is short it must aim right
And choice is forced you see.

“But do not fear
All are hear!
Some are just…not so near
Some are just…not so right
Some to us are now a blight
You of course may meet them all
But only in our thought-safe light!

“And…well-” (he reads from a glossy tract)
“Well it may be to meet the darkened faces
Out somewhere in the wild open places
Where ruby burns the dawn and black the night
And sirens of the hollow grasping wood
Call to you…

"-We would not go so wrong with you
Casting spells upon you
We would not send you out from pasture
Lacking compass, map, or measure

“…Come now, forget this room
It is but show, and you find gloom!”

Ten thousand books
A thousand faces
laugh at one – not you, the other
You wonder that he is not bothered
Perhaps he cannot see
Perhaps he chooses not to see