Differences Between Symbol and Psychosis
Alexander the Great
took as his symbol the characteristics
of Hercules, wearing the Horn of Ammon,
and with a lion’s skin draped
frivolously over this shoulders,
but was careful,
and permitted neither his authority nor his strength
to be thus derived. The Emperor Maximianus,
on the other hand,
allowed the simile to become a metaphor,
and was discovered, all too soon, in the Arena,
pounding his enemies with a club,
obligating his subjects to address him
as that Towering Bearer of the Universe.
Who would not revel in such a feat of the imagination?
Mix a pot, a mere handful of ingredients,
and soon you’ll blur
even the most discerning of palates.
Something else takes the place of each,
a seminal dissemination of what is new: the unknown.
Such is the meaning of complexity.