The Universe with which we grapple
searching for structure, meaning, is no apple
with glossy skin outside, substance beneath,
where deep within its core it meets our needs
to find its meaning: seeds.
No, it’s an onion – peel off the outer sheath
of sensory impressions,
and you uncover explanations
coming first from mystic revelations
and then from faith’s and Science’s professions.
Research from Galileo through to Quantum realms
reveals, and contradicts, and overwhelms
until you take away the final layer
and find: there’s nothing there.

*****

I’m a Militant Agnostic: “I don’t know, and neither do you!” We keep searching and probing, the certainties get disproved, new lines of enquiry open up… and off we go again, Quixote-like, because we’re humans.
This poem rhymes irregularly, and is in iambics of different line lengths. Semi-formal.

‘Layered Understanding’ was first published in the Shot Glass Journal #43.

Photo: “half onion peeled” by Hanna Khash is licensed under CC BY 2.0.