The Sin of Quietism

“Now Nature spoke, and she said nothing, loud and clear.”

We come to hold no beliefs
Who are the beliefs
Others hold, hold dear

Enough to die for,
Enough at least to kill for,
The blue summer evening’s breeze,

The silent clouds, the legends
Of forests of moonlit paths.
Here is our elegant math—

Every number is a name
For what a namer never
Encounters, the same

Phenomenon twice, the truth
That is distinct from the false,
Righteousness over the roof

Of a universe in which
What predicts never explains
What explanation predicts.