Inner Alien Nation

One writer writes, It’s foolish

To think you’re anything

But alone, while another

Writes, You are never alone.

Ha. You’re never of one mind.

One skull, sure. Too many minds,

A world of mind, which you hold

As much as one hotel room

In a megalopolis

Holds human population

Of the whole world passing through,

But only that slim fragment

Of inn that for the night is

Whole. When it comes to the mind,

Whitman called it first—the skull

Is small, but it does in fact

Contain multitudes, and they

Do contradict each other.

Not only are you alone,

It’s foolish to think you’re not—

Or are—or aren’t both at once.

Therefore, the bits of mind fight

In globes of bone, and all this

Gets called something like a poem.