Let Us Now Praise the Unanswerable Mysteries of Man: A Poem

What makes a car go?
And how does it stop?
And what is the relationship of rain to snow?

How are bridges made?
Do animals feel pain?
And what causes colors to softly fade?

Can blind people see?
What lights up the night sky?
And do tortillas grow on a tree?

Can a Frenchman laugh?
How do planes fly?
What's the difference between a shrimp and giraffe?

There are things, Hamlet opines
to some other fellow
that we'll never fathom in our simple minds

Mysteries for which there is no answer
Just impossible to know!
Feelings, not facts, elusive as a dancer

Who won World War Two?
Is tobacco the same as glass?
Is there an explanation for the word 'shoe'?

I've said it before
and I'll say it again
Here's to mysteries! Not science, but lore.

"One meets these occasions as quickly and carelessly as possible and retires once more back into the dream, hoping that things will adjust themselves by some great material or spiritual bonanza. But as the withdrawal persists there is less and less chance of the bonanza - one is not waiting for the fade-out of a single sorrow, but rather being an unwilling witness of an execution, the disintegration of one's own personality ..."
-- F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1936 interview with The New York Post

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/sep/18/classics.fscottfitzgerald/print

This, a wrenching interview with a broken Fitzgerald. I'm reminded of what Clive James wrote - "Fitzgerald's prose style can be called ravishing because it brings anguish with its enchantment."