After a Particularly Trying Philosophy Class

All the books are closed to me;

My mind cannot penetrate them.

I long to understand,

But never find what I seek.

Philosophers and physicists

Think away time and matter.

What does time matter

If it does not exist?

And still the way is closed to me;

Even that I cannot understand.

Yet what does understanding mean

If I do not exist?

For I must not, if time and matter do not.

I live in time, and my body is composed of matter.

Yet time and matter do not exist.

And therefore I do not exist.

This is why I say that

All the books are closed to me.

For what knowledge is in a book

That does not exist?

And what knowledge can I gain,

Who does not exist,

From anything

When nothing visible exists?