sonnet in praise of ignorance

Ignorance!  Intrepid schooner, parting 
the waves of Knowledge with your stately prow! 
The fools who wonder 'what?'  and 'why?' and 'how?' 
can build no craft to outstrip you, starting 
too far behind, too encumbered, carting 
Theory and Method -- those great loads weigh down 
their better-designed keel.  What great renown 
you gain, leaving all the wise men smarting. 
But if they did outrace you -- still, what good? 
The more they know, the less they understand. 
Their engines soil the Earth; their empty grand 
designs are each perverted to spill blood. 
What triumph, then, commands our reliance 
on this thin, vain, vacant dogma, Science? 






Copyright 1993 Edward Gaillard. All rights reserved.
If you want to re-distribute this piece, please ask me. You can mail me at : gaillard@panix.com