Like Viking ships...

[Benjamin]

Like Viking ships

emerging from a North Sea mist,

they come to pillage preconception.

Sonar scans, sat-maps and holograms,

cities, causeways and great walls

beneath the land and sea,

that predate all our notions.

And I wonder..

What is truth..

as I walk the cobbled streets

with foggy chimneys

and trinket shops,

where street singers

and nameless passers-by

are ghosts that we can never catch.

And did a man

who made the lamp burn upside down,

then truly cause the world

to cease its turning.

[fdelano]

Great mood piece linking eras and thinking. "ghosts that we can never catch" is a beautiful way to depict past ways and impressions. I love your visuals. Great work. The strange thing, to me, is that we now see Viking ships 'emerging from the mists' from our warm rooms on Netflix.

[Benjamin]

One of the advantages of age is that we can let our minds wander freely over so many past experiences and also embrace the scientific advances that alter our way of thinking.

The last four lines are a metaphorical slant from H.G. Wells' "The Man Who Could Work Miracles" with Robert Oppenheimer's famous quote also in mind: "I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." I believe humanity has risen and fallen at least twice in the history of this little planet.

[dcmarti1]

Your poem brings back the evocative & haunting, "From the fury of the Norsemen, O Lord, deliver us."

 

And with respect to this:

 

I believe humanity has risen and fallen at least twice in the history of this little planet.

 

I have had BRIEF passing thoughts about twice. No serious pondering, though.

[fdelano]

What do you mean by risen and fallen? Evolution cannot start from nothing.

[Benjamin]

Perhaps my choice of words leaves something to be desired.

"Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to relive it" is not a pleasant thought either; so it is crucial for everyone to do their own research and think for themselves, as you can no longer trust what you are being told about any subject. Especially those controversial issues. The arctic ice cap is melting and the weight of the Antarctic which is a large land mass could cause the earth to move on its axis. Indeed some believe it has already started. According to one scientist who appeared on a science documentary in 2008 the earth has tipped over on its side 11 times in the past. Not hard to believe when you consider the 4,500 billion years of the earths age. He said there was evidence of tropics at the poles and glaciers at the equator. Whether or not the earth tips over would obviously be hotly debatable; but the redistribution of that arctic ice weight will most definitely continue the tilt of our axis. The tipping over is a distinct possibility that we must consider. At the rate of the polar melting, scientists have made several statements reported by CNN that all polar ice will have melted by 2020.

Hope my insomnia is not too H.G. Wells, Orson Welles or infectious. G

[fdelano]

LOL. I can assure you that your insomnia is not infectious to someone who has his own share. As for global warming, we could use a little of that on the east coast of the U.S. ;)