Thought for the weekend

Why Fool Around?

How smart is smart? thinks Heart. Is smart
what's in the brain or the size of the container?
What do I know about what I do not know?
Such thoughts soon send Heart back to school.
Metaphysics, biophysics, economics, and history-
Heart takes them all. His back develops a crick

from lugging fifty books. He stays in the library

till it shuts down at night. The purpose of life,

says a prof, is to expand your horizons. Another says

it's to shrink existence to manageable proportions.

In astronomy, Heart studies spots through a telescope.

In biology, he sees the same spots with a microscope.

Heart absorbs so much that his brain aches. No

ski weekends for him, no joining the bridge club.

Ideas are nuts to be cracked open, Heart thinks.

History's the story of snatch and grab, says a prof.

The record of mankind, says another, is a striving

for the light. But Heart is beginning to catch on:

If knowledge is noise to which meaning is given,

then the words used to label sundry facts are like

horns honking before a collision: more forewarning

than explanation. Then what meaning, asks Heart,

can be given to meaning? Life's a pearl, says a prof.

It's a grizzly bear, says another. Heart's conclusion

is that to define the world decreases its dimensions

while to name a thing creates a sense of possession.

Heart admires their intention but why fool around?

He picks up a pebble and states: The world is like

this rock. He puts it in his pocket for safe keeping.

Having settled at last the nature of learning, Heart

goes fishing. He leans back against an oak. The sun

toasts his feet. Heart feels the pebble in his pocket.

Its touch is like the comfort of money in the bank.

There are big ones to be caught, big ones to be eaten.

In morning light, trout swim within the tree's shadow.

Smart or stupid they circle the hook: their education.
-- Stephen Dobyns