Folly Forever

The Fool is us

At first sight, first breath,

First of everything and always.

If you look close enough

You can see him dancing

In the babe’s glimmering

Gaze; hear his laugh

In every puppy bark.

He is there even when

Darkness rushes in

To lay its claim.

For just a moment,

It cannot and the unspoilt

Splendour of everything blazes

Through blissful blindness.

Then Time the Taker comes

To burden us with baggage,

And we tell ourselves

We have moved on,

Ripened and raised

Into firm identities and beliefs;

All of us, knowing ones, cynics,

Jaded, damaged and dead certain

Of something. All of us, still

Fools.

So it is revealed when suddenly

We stand quivering

At the threshold of awe and terror;

When catastrophe hurls us

Into the dread unseen,

Or at the end, when Fatality

Falls upon us to drag us

Into the final unknown.

At every step the Fool remains

With us and within us, from beginning

To end, there to gasp and scream

As knowledge crumbles, and we are filled

With vast spaces of ineffability.

The Fool stands firm to keep us

Warm while we are and remain

Infants in the cradle of infinity.