Raw Scales

Grinding against the dirt ground
peeling rough scales for soft, minor tones.
Ouch! Is this what life is made for?
Death drive to remind me that I'm alive.

Flake by flake my viscera sags on,
filling any box that seems fit to reproduce.
In creation lies exploitation; a sentence fit
only for divinities, therefore no one at all.

Begrudging songs the scavengers sing for me,
expecting a new meal in the next hours.
Will it be me, or my skin or my viscera?
Any way, it's not as good as goring myself
on sunshine.

For that all of nature is a whore,
damaging our moral integrity for the advantage
of the angels, we are almost good enough.
Give me a glance or give me death.

Describe an extrapolation that begets intrusion,
advantageous manipulation by hand on heart.
Trust, the illusion, hearkens the snake to it's offender:
the dirt and stones can't break no bones,
what's left behind heaven can't know.

Art's Breath Plastered on the Walls

There’s one plant to welcome you now, after 5, then 2.

They have disappeared, no longer guarding my

introspective mate from subversion.

Thus, in these walls, we all crash together.

Candles abound, but only lit so often

as to elucidate the dusted book collection:

my base of time-earned information.

Thus, in these walls we, all crash together.

Budget-sleek and modern furniture frames

musical entries, my shoes on a worn Persian rug,

as my toes to tread against the world.

My walls are putting me up as art.

Clocks everywhere to remind me.

In every moment, fatigue and decay

remembrance, reiteration, thus rebirth.

My walls are putting me up as art.

Entreat yourself in a distraction of choice

look deeply in corners and manically count crumbles.

The bristles have no companions!

These surfaces cannot be white-glove failures!

Distracted, it’s where you need to be.

If you breathe and don’t panic,

when it stops in moments of time…

You’re in my home, make it yours. 

A Socratic Approach to Free Markets

Based on Socrates’ argument that the good life is determined by wisdom, or utilizing intellectual humility in acknowledging one doesn’t know what one in fact doesn’t, one can solve the tragedy of the commons by ensuring objective, rational methods structure a wise, sustainable free market system; in that no entity claims to know better than the other on what to produce, how to produce it, and how, to whom, and in exchange for what to distribute it. In doing so, the markets will evolve to reflect a growing consciousness of the collective effect on our natural resources. Furthermore, this would eliminate the welfare state and help to solve the geometric expansion of human population, a major contributor to the tragedy of the commons.

            If a free market system were to be implemented, it would certainly fit Socrates’ criteria for a wise system of economics. As he states: “I might perhaps fancy myself wiser than other men, - that whereas I know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I know”, therefore wisdom is simply the acknowledgement of those things not known and not able to be known. Free market economics governs by the same reasonable and rational policy, by stating that it is impossible to know what to produce, when, how, and how much to produce, and for what cost the finished product should be sold for. Furthermore, free market economics states that laws of supply and demand hold the rational reigns of the market, for they are the only entities that “know” the aforementioned qualities to objective pragmatic perfectionism; whereas man can only speculate, guess, and eventually simultaneously be incorrect and unwise in Socrates’ view. With free market economy comes an extremely small and economically resourceless government. Thus, no government would be able to afford supporting the poor and unable through the welfare state. In doing so, the economic system would instill an ideal postulated by Garrett Harding in The Tragedy of the Commons, “If each human family were dependent only on its own resources; if the children of improvident parents starved to death; if, thus, over breeding brought its own "punishment" to the germ line--then there would be no public interest in controlling the breeding of families.” Therefore, overpopulation would be regulated over a period of time and through “parental responsibility” (Commons) eventually abolished by the wisest entities; also referred to as supply and demand. In other words, if a Darwinian system were reinstated, the population would react in a negative correlation over a period of time due to a scarcity of goods and resources, and therefore the lessening of a desire for an additional life to support. According to the same rules, as scarcity overcomes a limited amount of resources, the price of goods would increase, causing a lessening of demand from aforementioned lessening base of consumers in reaction to price increases, and therefore a lessening of demand to produce and a lesser supply. Conclusively, this would limit exclusively privatized natural resource use without any top down interference from an unwise higher body, imposing its authority as a statement of supposed wisdom. As a result of less demand for a decreasing supply of finished goods, more people would have time to do as Socrates deems is the path of access to the good life: “the greatest good of man is daily to converse about virtue” and to avoid the tragedy described as “the life which is unexamined is not worth living”, rather than sell their labor as a product to the market that enslaves them to other, non-inherently valuable products.

            In objecting to these points, one could propose that the labor market will be taken advantage of by producers and distributors without government bound minimum wage and labor laws. As a negotiator for one’s own worth, and an ever-limited labor pool, these entities would have to pay a mutually agreeable amount for reasonable work; furthermore, laborers would ensure their work was of competitive quality. An additional objection may be that some essential goods shall not be privatized: water, for example. This proposed system would ensure that quality of water remain as high and the price of water would remain as low as allowed by Darwinian population control, further satisfying the Tragedy of the Commons. Finally, in saying that government control is to be trusted more than private entities, it can be said that private entities themselves would not be in control of markets, rather market forces whom know best (because they know nothing at all, only how to react to real circumstances) would fuel this system. It’s impossible to corrupt a thing that is not a thinking thing.