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I'm a participant in the doctrine of constructive ambiguity.

quote by Vernon A. Walters
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The Hind And The Panther, A Poem In Three Parts : Part II.

“Dame,” said the Panther, “times are mended well,
Since late among the Philistines you fell.
The toils were pitched, a spacious tract of ground
With expert huntsmen was encompassed round;
The inclosure narrowed; the sagacious power
Of hounds and death drew nearer every hour.
'Tis true, the younger lion 'scaped the snare,
But all your priestly calves lay struggling there,
As sacrifices on their altars laid;
While you, their careful mother, wisely fled,
Not trusting destiny to save your head.
For, whate'er promises you have applied
To your unfailing Church, the surer side
Is four fair legs in danger to provide;
And whate'er tales of Peter's chair you tell,
Yet, saving reverence of the miracle,
The better luck was yours to 'scape so well.”
“As I remember,” said the sober Hind,
“Those toils were for your own dear self designed,
As well as me; and with the selfsame throw,
To catch the quarry and the vermin too,—
Forgive the slanderous tongues that called you so.
Howe'er you take it now, the common cry
Then ran you down for your rank loyalty.
Besides, in Popery they thought you nurst,
As evil tongues will ever speak the worst,
Because some forms, and ceremonies some
You kept, and stood in the main question dumb.
Dumb you were born indeed; but, thinking long,
The test, it seems, at last has loosed your tongue:
And to explain what your forefathers meant,
By real presence in the sacrament,
After long fencing pushed against a wall,
Your salvo comes, that he's not there at all:
There changed your faith, and what may change may fall.
Who can believe what varies every day,
Nor ever was, nor will be at a stay?”
“Tortures may force the tongue untruths to tell,
And I ne'er owned myself infallible,”
Replied the Panther: “grant such presence were,
Yet in your sense I never owned it there.
A real virtue we by faith receive,
And that we in the sacrament believe.”
“Then,” said the Hind, “as you the matter state,
Not only Jesuits can equivocate;
For real, as you now the word expound,
From solid substance dwindles to a sound.
Methinks, an Æsop's fable you repeat;
You know who took the shadow for the meat:
Your Church's substance thus you change at will,

[...] Read more

poem by John Dryden
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The Interpretation of Nature and

I.

MAN, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or in thought of the course of nature: beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.


II.

Neither the naked hand nor the understanding left to itself can effect much. It is by instruments and helps that the work is done, which are as much wanted for the understanding as for the hand. And as the instruments of the hand either give motion or guide it, so the instruments of the mind supply either suggestions for the understanding or cautions.

III.

Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule.

IV.

Towards the effecting of works, all that man can do is to put together or put asunder natural bodies. The rest is done by nature working within.

V.

The study of nature with a view to works is engaged in by the mechanic, the mathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the magician; but by all (as things now are) with slight endeavour and scanty success.

VI.

It would be an unsound fancy and self-contradictory to expect that things which have never yet been done can be done except by means which have never yet been tried.

VII.

The productions of the mind and hand seem very numerous in books and manufactures. But all this variety lies in an exquisite subtlety and derivations from a few things already known; not in the number of axioms.

VIII.

Moreover the works already known are due to chance and experiment rather than to sciences; for the sciences we now possess are merely systems for the nice ordering and setting forth of things already invented; not methods of invention or directions for new works.

IX.

The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this -- that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.

X.

The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding; so that all those specious meditations, speculations, and glosses in which men indulge are quite from the purpose, only there is no one by to observe it.

XI.

As the sciences which we now have do not help us in finding out new works, so neither does the logic which we now have help us in finding out new sciences.

XII.

The logic now in use serves rather to fix and give stability to the errors which have their foundation in commonly received notions than to help the search after truth. So it does more harm than good.

XIII.

[...] Read more

poem by Sir Francis Bacon
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Experiment with truth, now with instrument

Experiment with truth,
Now with instrument
A TV programme is
Presently being aired
Where telling truths
Will help a person
Win rupees to the tune of a crore

Truth is here defined
As telling what is there
In the thought

Truth is sharing your thought,
Which most of us
Will not like to do
As many of us
Nurse bad, wild and ugly thoughts

This programme
With the award it projects
Induces people to come out
With what they thought, think and will think
At a specific a past, present and
Probable possible future event
An instrument, they call it polygraph
Detects whether what is said is true or otherwise
As it is capable of
Recording changes in
Blood pressure,
Pulse rate,
Electrocardiogram
And similar other
Changes in circulatory and nervous systems
That occur
When a person misrepresents
His thought

This programme is held
In the presence of persons
Involved in the participant’s life

All look fine till the time
When the truth shared by the person
Revolves around him/her and
Does not surface the actual thought process
With regard to the relationships
With others,
And especially those who are on the stage
And witnessing the event

[...] Read more

poem by Bashyam Narayanan
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Hudibras: Part 3 - Canto II

THE ARGUMENT

The Saints engage in fierce Contests
About their Carnal interests;
To share their sacrilegious Preys,
According to their Rates of Grace;
Their various Frenzies to reform,
When Cromwel left them in a Storm
Till, in th' Effigy of Rumps, the Rabble
Burns all their Grandees of the Cabal.

THE learned write, an insect breeze
Is but a mungrel prince of bees,
That falls before a storm on cows,
And stings the founders of his house;
From whose corrupted flesh that breed
Of vermin did at first proceed.
So e're the storm of war broke out,
Religion spawn'd a various rout
Of petulant Capricious sects,
The maggots of corrupted texts,
That first run all religion down,
And after ev'ry swarm its own.
For as the Persian Magi once
Upon their mothers got their sons,
That were incapable t' enjoy
That empire any other way;
So PRESBYTER begot the other
Upon the good old Cause, his mother,
Then bore then like the Devil's dam,
Whose son and husband are the same.
And yet no nat'ral tie of blood
Nor int'rest for the common good
Cou'd, when their profits interfer'd,
Get quarter for each other's beard.
For when they thriv'd, they never fadg'd,
But only by the ears engag'd:
Like dogs that snarl about a bone,
And play together when they've none,
As by their truest characters,
Their constant actions, plainly appears.
Rebellion now began, for lack
Of zeal and plunders to grow slack;
The Cause and covenant to lessen,
And Providence to b' out of season:
For now there was no more to purchase
O' th' King's Revenue, and the Churches,
But all divided, shar'd, and gone,
That us'd to urge the Brethren on;
Which forc'd the stubborn'st for the Cause,

[...] Read more

poem by Samuel Butler
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There's Power In Ambiguity

She knows there's power in ambiguity
And she lords it over me
Not even flaunting it like some gift but shoving it my face
Being rude and ignoring me enough to make question are we even friends? !
And nice enough to keep me close, leaving me to crave more, she sends
These mixed signals and I can't keep pace
While her true feelings remain hidden as she wields her power
I can feel it sap my strength hour after hour
I can't do this forever
O these ties I wish I could sever
But there's nothing I can do because I'm pushed far away like a stranger
Yet drawn closer through nicety to my greatest danger
And overwhelming desire
It's ALL her
But she wields ambiguity, the greatest weapon: ' Not Knowing'
The cruelest response: not showing: affection or love when its given you
Being incapable of saying those words: I love you too
Much less to be the one who starts the compliments
But the one who repulses me, like I'm some sort of offense
The ambiguity
Is just stronger than me...
If 'Not Knowing' is the worst
Then the one I supposedly love is my curse

poem by David Knox
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Give Me Image

Enough!
Enough of this...
Self righteous ambiguity!
Fed by those seeking consciousness.

Give me image.
I have yet to have enough,
Of this 'truth-as-I-see-it-life-I-live'.'.

Give me image.

How else can it be expected,
I keep my pretensions alive and thriving?
Do not rid from me my freedom,
To exist living for images I see fit to project.
I can not bare the acceptance of the reality...
Thrown in my face I am suppose to respect!

Give me image!
Do not strip me of my need,
To seek quality delusions to please, eat and feed.

Give me image.
So that I may feel free,
To live in the midst of unending fantasies.
And aspects of threatening truth...
Disturbs my mentality!
As I witness it pursue the awakening of masses.
Pass me my rose colored glasses, please!

Enough!
Enough of this...
Self righteous ambiguity!

Give me image.
I have yet to have enough,
Of this 'truth-as-I-see-it-life-I-live'.'.

Give me image.

Let those images forever in my mind,
Find within me reason to exist!

Give me image.
And enough...
Enough of this,
Self righteous ambiguity.
Fed by those seeking consciousness.

poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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If you can impress any man with an absorbing conviction of the supreme importance of some moral or religious doctrine if you can make him believe that those who reject that doctrine are doomed to eternal perdition if you then give that man power, and by means of his ignorance blind him to the ulterior consequences of his own act,-he will infallibly persecute those who deny his doctrine.

quote by Henry Thomas Buckle
Added by Lucian Velea
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Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society

Epigraph

Υδραν φονεύσας, μυρίων τ᾽ ἄλλων πόνων
διῆλθον ἀγέλας . . .
τὸ λοίσθιον δὲ τόνδ᾽ ἔτλην τάλας πόνον,
. . . δῶμα θριγκῶσαι κακοῖς.

I slew the Hydra, and from labour pass'd
To labour — tribes of labours! Till, at last,
Attempting one more labour, in a trice,
Alack, with ills I crowned the edifice.

You have seen better days, dear? So have I —
And worse too, for they brought no such bud-mouth
As yours to lisp "You wish you knew me!" Well,
Wise men, 't is said, have sometimes wished the same,
And wished and had their trouble for their pains.
Suppose my Œdipus should lurk at last
Under a pork-pie hat and crinoline,
And, latish, pounce on Sphynx in Leicester Square?
Or likelier, what if Sphynx in wise old age,
Grown sick of snapping foolish people's heads,
And jealous for her riddle's proper rede, —
Jealous that the good trick which served the turn
Have justice rendered it, nor class one day
With friend Home's stilts and tongs and medium-ware,—
What if the once redoubted Sphynx, I say,
(Because night draws on, and the sands increase,
And desert-whispers grow a prophecy)
Tell all to Corinth of her own accord.
Bright Corinth, not dull Thebes, for Lais' sake,
Who finds me hardly grey, and likes my nose,
And thinks a man of sixty at the prime?
Good! It shall be! Revealment of myself!
But listen, for we must co-operate;
I don't drink tea: permit me the cigar!
First, how to make the matter plain, of course —
What was the law by which I lived. Let 's see:
Ay, we must take one instant of my life
Spent sitting by your side in this neat room:
Watch well the way I use it, and don't laugh!
Here's paper on the table, pen and ink:
Give me the soiled bit — not the pretty rose!
See! having sat an hour, I'm rested now,
Therefore want work: and spy no better work
For eye and hand and mind that guides them both,
During this instant, than to draw my pen
From blot One — thus — up, up to blot Two — thus —
Which I at last reach, thus, and here's my line
Five inches long and tolerably straight:

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning (1871)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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A Letter From Li Po

Fanfare of northwest wind, a bluejay wind
announces autumn, and the equinox
rolls back blue bays to a far afternoon.
Somewhere beyond the Gorge Li Po is gone,
looking for friendship or an old love's sleeve
or writing letters to his children, lost,
and to his children's children, and to us.
What was his light? of lamp or moon or sun?
Say that it changed, for better or for worse,
sifted by leaves, sifted by snow; on mulberry silk
a slant of witch-light; on the pure text
a slant of genius; emptying mind and heart
for winecups and more winecups and more words.
What was his time? Say that it was a change,
but constant as a changing thing may be,
from chicory's moon-dark blue down the taut scale
to chicory's tenderest pink, in a pink field
such as imagination dreams of thought.
But of the heart beneath the winecup moon
the tears that fell beneath the winecup moon
for children lost, lost lovers, and lost friends,
what can we say but that it never ends?
Even for us it never ends, only begins.
Yet to spell down the poem on her page,
margining her phrases, parsing forth
the sevenfold prism of meaning, up the scale
from chicory pink to blue, is to assume
Li Po himself: as he before assumed
the poets and the sages who were his.
Like him, we too have eaten of the word:
with him are somewhere lost beyond the Gorge:
and write, in rain, a letter to lost children,
a letter long as time and brief as love.

II

And yet not love, not only love. Not caritas
or only that. Nor the pink chicory love,
deep as it may be, even to moon-dark blue,
in which the dragon of his meaning flew
for friends or children lost, or even
for the beloved horse, for Li Po's horse:
not these, in the self's circle so embraced:
too near, too dear, for pure assessment: no,
a letter crammed and creviced, crannied full,
storied and stored as the ripe honeycomb
with other faith than this. As of sole pride
and holy loneliness, the intrinsic face
worn by the always changing shape between
end and beginning, birth and death.

[...] Read more

poem by Conrad Potter Aiken
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Religio Laici

(OR A LAYMAN'S FAITH)

Dim, as the borrow'd beams of moon and stars
To lonely, weary, wand'ring travellers,
Is reason to the soul; and as on high,
Those rolling fires discover but the sky
Not light us here; so reason's glimmering ray
Was lent not to assure our doubtful way,
But guide us upward to a better day.
And as those nightly tapers disappear
When day's bright lord ascends our hemisphere
So pale grows reason at religion's sight:
So dies, and so dissolves in supernatural light.
Some few, whose lamp shone brighter, have been led
From cause to cause, to Nature's secret head;
And found that one first principle must be:
But what, or who, that Universal He;
Whether some soul incompassing this ball
Unmade, unmov'd; yet making, moving all;
Or various atoms' interfering dance
Leapt into form (the noble work of chance
Or this great all was from eternity;
Not even the Stagirite himself could see;
And Epicurus guess'd as well as he:
As blindly grop'd they for a future state;
As rashly judg'd of Providence and Fate:
But least of all could their endeavours find
What most concern'd the good of human kind.
For happiness was never to be found;
But vanish'd from 'em, like enchanted ground.
One thought content the good to be enjoy'd:
This, every little accident destroy'd:
The wiser madmen did for virtue toil:
A thorny, or at best a barren soil:
In pleasure some their glutton souls would steep;
But found their line too short, the well too deep;
And leaky vessels which no bliss could keep.
Thus anxious thoughts in endless circles roll,
Without a centre where to fix the soul:
In this wild maze their vain endeavours end:
How can the less the greater comprehend?
Or finite reason reach infinity?
For what could fathom God were more than He.

The Deist thinks he stands on firmer ground;
Cries [lang g]eur{-e}ka[lang e] the mighty secret's found:
God is that spring of good; supreme, and best;
We, made to serve, and in that service blest;
If so, some rules of worship must be given;
Distributed alike to all by Heaven:

[...] Read more

poem by John Dryden
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Bible in Poetry: Gospel of St. John 2 (Chapter 1)

The elder to lady, children,
Who love the truth and know it long;
For sake of truth that dwells in us,
And shall be with us forever.

The grace and mercy, peace of God
The Father, and the Son, Jesus
Christ’s truth and love too be with you!

I found thy children walk in truth,
And I rejoice greatly therefore,
As we’ve received the commandments,
From Father, Almighty, Lord, God.

And now, I beseech thee, lady!
I’ve written not a new command,
But that we had from beginning,
That said we love one another.

To love is commandment greatest,
And when we walk in His commands,
It is all love that’s pure, divine,
And hence, we must do from the start.

The deceiver who enters the world,
And says that Jesus was ne’er flesh,
Is deceiver and antichrist!

Take care that we do not then lose,
Those things that we have wrought with toil,
And that we get our full reward.

Whoever transgresses this then,
And doesn’t abide in Christ’s doctrine,
Loses the God of love in him;
He who abides in Christ’s doctrine,
Has Father and the Son as well.

If anyone should come to you,
Without the doctrine of Jesus,
Receive him not into your house,
And neither bid him then, God speed,
For, if you so bid him, then you,
Partake of his evil deeds too.

I have so many things to write,
But I will not with paper, ink;
But want to see you, face to face,
And speak, so that our joy is full!
The children of elect sister,

[...] Read more

poem by John Celes
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Hudibras: Part 2 - Canto II

THE ARGUMENT

The Knight and Squire, in hot dispute,
Within an ace of falling out,
Are parted with a sudden fright
Of strange alarm, and stranger sight;
With which adventuring to stickle,
They're sent away in nasty pickle.

'Tis strange how some mens' tempers suit
(Like bawd and brandy) with dispute,
That for their own opinions stand last
Only to have them claw'd and canvast;
That keep their consciences in cases,
As fiddlers do their crowds and bases,
Ne'er to be us'd, but when they're bent
To play a fit for argument;
Make true and false, unjust and just,
Of no use but to be discust;
Dispute, and set a paradox
Like a straight boot upon the stocks,
And stretch it more unmercifully
Than HELMONT, MONTAIGN, WHITE, or TULLY,
So th' ancient Stoicks, in their porch,
With fierce dispute maintain'd their church;
Beat out their brains in fight and study,
To prove that Virtue is a Body;
That Bonum is an Animal,
Made good with stout polemic brawl;
in which some hundreds on the place
Were slain outright; and many a face
Retrench'd of nose, and eyes, and beard,
To maintain what their sect averr'd;
All which the Knight and Squire, in wrath,
Had like t' have suffered for their faith,
Each striving to make good his own,
As by the sequel shall be shown.

The Sun had long since, in the lap
Of THETIS, taken out his nap,
And, like a lobster boil'd, the morn
From black to red began to turn,
When HUDIBRAS, whom thoughts and aking,
'Twixt sleeping kept all night and waking,
Began to rub his drowsy eyes,
And from his couch prepar'd to rise,
Resolving to dispatch the deed
He vow'd to do with trusty speed.
But first, with knocking loud, and bawling,
He rouz'd the Squire, in truckle lolling;

[...] Read more

poem by Samuel Butler
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Cruel Formality

The dark weather spreading all place people shivered by cool humidity
Somebody shivered without food they wealth thieving cruel people like beast they cry
Turn to back for doctrine demolish impartial earn money from pray
Although they thieving money from innocent man who shivered beneath cold with sever hungry

The rich man drunk and with fill full stomach kicking innocent people
At last programmed of development country poverty people killing or arrest using them power of command till end of life
The king of people around many of queen drinking wine eating grapes discussing condition of people
Although suffered people by poverty around anybody no one shivered by rich man curse

Greedy judges and lawyers no sense of doctrine never giving for recompenses for living
Try to hang suffered people without guilty seem everything tie with lying
Just seem to be visage of poverty innocent people they turn to charge try to arrest they noising
Without free walking in him motherland living in formality who one talks him party for surviving

Every hoped broke cry him front of altar do pure my sole till redness both eyes
Although every one cure for rich people they never singing or written sad poems
Heritage of own country living and freely talking freely for fill stomach well without blanks
Make him courage for see better formality the doctrine follow him whispered blowing winds

poem by Inguruwatta Pushpadewa
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Dollars And Cents

there better things to talk about
be constructive
bear witness
we can use
be constructive
with your blues
even he turn the water blues
even you turn the water green
why dont you quiet down?
all over the neighbours
maybe if i can see out here
all over the clovers
let me out of here
all over
why dont you quiet down ?

we are the dollars and cents
and the pounds and the pence
and the mark and the yen

we are going to crack your little souls

song performed by Radiohead
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Dollar & Cents (2000-06-13: Thtre Antique D'arles, France)

There are things to talk about
Be constructive
There are weapons, we can use
Be constructive
With your blues
Even when they tore the wall down
Even when they tore the wall down
Why don't you quiet down?
Why won't you quiet down?
Why don't you quiet down?
Why won't you quiet down?
??
We are the dollar and cents

song performed by Radiohead
Added by Lucian Velea
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Dollars & Cents

Dollars and cents
There are things to talk about
Be constructive
There are weapons, we can use
Be constructive
With your blues
Even when they tore the wall down
Even when they tore the wall down
Why dont you quiet down?
Why wont you quiet down?
Why dont you quiet down?
Why wont you quiet down?
We are the dollars and cents and the pounds and pence. were gonna crush your
Little soul. crush you little soul.

song performed by Radiohead
Added by Lucian Velea
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It is easier to learn to interpret dreams if you have a reason to use them for something constructive. You apply your dream insights to making constructive changes in your life.

quote by Henry Reed
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Boomerang

Anger a Boomerang destructive..
To self own itself an enemy afflicted
Never can anger bond with the opponent
Instead can acquire grudgeful resentment
What else than being angry, angered then..
A thought of 'why' could be
Erratic, errorful itself On self own
Than on others erratic, errorful
O'dear friend
Attest, can any one errorless..no
Pray thereso by self's conscience
For no anger, no sin
O'dear friend
Attest, can anyone erroless...yes
So if there, pervades then love wholesome
A Boomerang constructive sans anger
O'dear friend, you decide on a Boomerang
Constructive or destructive..

poem by Indira Renganathan
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4. Elements – Fire

The element of fire
Constructive, destructive
The bright light of fire
The slight of fire
The all consuming fire

Does not exist
In its natural form
Exists by consuming
Another form
It transforms from one
Form to another form

Fuels our passion
Leaves everything ashen
Duels the darkness
Heaves on compassion

Fire, constructively destructive
Fire, destructively constructive
Fire, living death
Fire, dying life

poem by Anand Dixit
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Fire Element

The element of fire
Constructive, destructive
The bright light of fire
The slight of fire
The all consuming fire

Does not exist
In its natural form
Exists by consuming
Another form
It transforms from one
Form to another form

Fuels our passion
Leaves everything ashen
Duels the darkness
Heaves on compassion

Fire, constructively destructive
Fire, destructively constructive
Fire, living death
Fire, dying life

poem by Ricky Baker
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