The Invention of Discretion

We proceed by division
To wholes and subdivisions.
We see quanta everywhere.

These gods are only language,
But languages are the gods,
Our discrete, countable gods—

Infinitesimal imps,
Fractious household deities,
Irrational seraphim.

Your One God. My Nothing God.
Our holy, continuous
Approximating what is

In all ways continuous,
Except that meanings emerge
In our patterns and vanish.

We count what means to vanish.
We name our gods. They vanish.
Our names shape us. We vanish.

We can argue, and we do,
Re discrete phenomena.
We can argue, and we will,

About the ethics of names,
The morality of gods,
Purest thought’s indiscretions.

Is it not a mystery,
However, our invention
Of this powerful failure—

Useful approximation
By name and number of what
Is otherwise forever?