Trees of Death
In the center of the garden
Grow two trees
The trees of life and knowledge
Of good and evil
Sparkling with fruit — the ancient Ionians
Might know the two
as Physis and Nomos
Nature and custom
Physis, physician, and Nomos,
The shepherd, the nomeus
And who is this nomeus?
What does he do?
What does he value
And think of as good?
Mutilates sheep, exploits,
Provides security
Protection, as the gangsters say
Se cura, the absence of care
No care, but knowledge
Of an instrumental sort
The healer’s, though,
A provider of care.
And Physis, which heals, and grows,
Becomes — as Adam and Eve
Eat fruit from the tree
Of knowledge
of good and evil
They feel instantly ashamed
And why would they get this idea?
Because it’s not knowledge at all,
But dogma
From this tree of death
Opposed to living thought
The tree of death,
Whose fruit is false law
Whose order destroys the true tree
Of ease, well-being, justice.
Which one’s fruits
do you distribute