Metaphors Are Contranyms

Primitive, elusive, bridgers
Of borders, osmotic organs

Of knowledge and education,
Metaphors have been called all these

And by one mathematician.
You can find library shelves full

Of tomes on metaphor. You could
Spend your life cataloging them.

Your life itself you understand
Mostly in terms of metaphors,

Maybe only so. Every word,
Every number, every symbol

May be in some form metaphor.
Topics like time and nothingness

Can only be sidled up to
Metaphorically, if at all.

Essential, core technology
That they are, however, do you

Ever understand metaphors
Any better than the hardware

And software that structures your world?
Even that well? Prometheus

Didn’t steal fire for you. He stole
Metaphor. Soma was never

Potent beverage. Soma was
A metaphor, was metaphor.

Metaphor is the fire, the drug
Itself you’ve never understood,

Only used, your magic weapon
Cleaving all truth it can cleave to.