What Kind of Tracks Are These?

by John Steffler

This morning, is the interrogative the only working gear?

Could we say it’s similar to reverse because operating in
Why? or How? we can’t clearly see where we’re going or
gain much speed?

And don’t we find ourselves slowly reviewing a landscape
we earlier passed through taking it in only subliminally if
at all?

And aren’t we now seeing the backside of what we took for
the front?

Is it stupid to assume that the first glimpse we have of a thing
is its front?

Does looking back at the way you’ve come make you realize
you’re lost?

Which European philosopher believed that asking questions
delays or deflects the movement of time?

Are you irritated by lists?

If you could swivel your head like an owl would reverse be
equal to forward?

Likewise, if we refuse to accumulate answers, can a barrage
of questions offer vertical lift?

Are questions inherently more comical than statements?

While a question clearly leads to a gulf that anyone might fill,
is it not true that statements use their bulk or authority or
menace or brutality or beauty or their intimidating confidence
or blurred complexity to conceal the empty gulf behind where
they started?

Do you assume there’s someone inside you who could explain
how you got where you are?