Even Though You’ll Never Know

You would like to feel you know a thing
Or possibly two about the world,
But you alternate between extremes

Of an overwhelming sense of your
Utter ignorance and a foolish
Confidence concerning this or that.

For instance, you hold unwarranted
Certainty that others are like you
In exactly this respect—they, too

Feel overwhelmed by the trembling world,
Transfixed by their inability
To comprehend what action to take,

Yet possessed of overweening pride
In their understanding of something
Vast and vague enough to fake it well—

How late-capitalism functions,
Why post-colonial governments
Don’t, what a good human being is.

Is there a way to make confession
Of ignorance, of lack of wisdom,
Without turning it into boasting

By the time you’re done genuflecting?
Dig a small cottage into a hill,
Maybe, make it livable, call it

The echo of your skull, that real place
Where whatever you’ve been thinking goes.
When your skull looks like the world, you’ll know.