the empty machine

minds do not emerge
as metaphors
would like them to
the machinery, empty
mysteriously move through
space, time

how are we to know
if any thing exists at all
if this, our greatest illusion
kept up its charade
until the very last
and beyond

i cannot know anything
a god or a self
but only
to have concepts of them
trust them
to be our creations

that the world
out there
is void and full
all at once
from the beginning, and
until the very end