Know Thyself (At The Gate) Poem by RIC BASTASA

at the gate
there hangs this notice

know thyself, and i
reflect upon it, how other

people can be so mean
about his neighbor simply because

and this is too important
he is confused and does not know what
to do

about himself, and his being mean,
and so the notice at the gate still hangs in there
and it will be for a long, long time,

until man really knows himself,
which could at time be too confusing too,

for how can one so embellished in himself
not know himself, for how can one be so attached

to his bone and flesh and his veins
be not knowing himself, and so i reflected some more,

where is thyself? is it not a possibility too
that there is no self and so one is too unhappy

because he searches for himself througout his whole
lifetime only to find out that there is no such

self as I?

come to think of it, who am I? and who are you?