Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Aug 2016
Philosophy has taught me never to think I know,
for I know nothing at all,
and this is the only thing I know for sure.
Imagine you are in a cave,
you were born here,
and have been here ever since.
you are chained to face a wall,
can not move,
but know nothing different.
On the wall there are shadows,
cast from behind you,
caused by dancing figures in front of a flame.
You can not see these figures,
but you know them by their shadows.
Beside you, is another,
another just like yourself,
born and raised to stare at the shadows,
and just like you, knows nothing different.
Now imagine one day,
you are set free from your chains,
and you are brought to a door,
behind the door is a life you never knew could exist,
the sun, the trees, the world as we know it now.
You would be astonished,
amazed that you had lived your life from this point,
never knowing it was there.
Now say you were brought back to your chains,
reunited with the other,
who has not yet seen the world for what it is.
Would you be able to explain to them,
that there is a world beyond the shadows?
For the shadows are all they know,
they have become so familiar,
that they are able to guess the figures before their arrival.
How would you explain that there is a fantastic world beyond what they see?
it's simple.
You couldn't.
And forever, they will be trapped,
not knowing that there is so much more to life.
I feel that this is the way of the world.
The cosmos, being as big as it is,
and religion, giving claims as it does.
The people have no way of seeing what else is out there.
What happens after they die.
What life is truly about.
They never even wonder.
And than, they just die.
Mike Patten
Written by
Mike Patten
768
     Ravanna Dee and Silverflame
Please log in to view and add comments on poems