The Invention of Similarity

Try to get out of your mind
Illusions of illusions.
Some waves command attention

While most are safely ignored,
But there’s nothing that’s more real
Than anything else, only

Silly statements like this one
That insist they know what’s real.
Even likeness has to be

Reinvented constantly.
We all proceed by likeness,
Category’s founding myth.

Artifacts that speak or dead
Creatures that live again or
Mixed-up predictive patterns,

All scrambled sameness depends
On sameness to begin, and
Every likeness is the same.

How enormous each is, how
Little, juxtaposable
Once there are categories,

Each one more or less alike,
This much more or this much less
The same. Nothing is the same.