As primates we require
facial expressions
physical contact
social discourse
to survive yet our
engineering skills and
powers of abstraction
create living environments that
deny us these elements
placing our collective sanity in question.

Time spent observing and experiencing
is increasingly lost to time spent
vicariously interacting
in virutal communities
inhabited by creatures lurking inside
mobile cocoons
swarming over an alphalt web or
lounging inside suburban fortresses
surrounded by grassy moats
communicating electronically
to others creatures
imprisoned within their own
customized
sensory deprivation chambers.
Can understanding be
achieved without
touching
prodding
sniffing
tasting
or does all sensibility
begin and end with sensation?

Imagine an infant
born without the ability to
see
hear
touch
smell
taste
born without
those messy instruments of observation
that interfere with a
mytho-poetic imagination
longing to be unburdened
by an intrusive material world.

By sheer force of will
this brain will construct ghosts
masquerading as images
but these manifestations are forever
locked away
from the rest of humanity.
This child will never experience
the movements of the heavens
the song of the meadowlark
a crisp breeze on his face
the immodest fragrance of lilac
the dilated pupils of a lover
or the taste of salt on her neck.
Understanding
at any level
by any definition
does not exist
and imagination
whilst unfettered by real-world stimulation
becomes a sentence of eternal isolation.

Nonetheless
we barricade ourselves behind
televisions
computer screens
tinted car windows
cell phones
gated communities
security alarms
office cubicles
private spas
all in a desperate attempt
to improve the quality of our lives.

Maybe there's something to be said
after all
for epistemological realism.
After all
isn't it at least
somewhat ironic
that I'm writing this now
and you're reading it
yet likely we've never met?