Uncertainty of knowing

Wendy Lowe

Bobbing along in our little sea-crafts
huddled against the swell of the tide
that is pulled by a thread from the luminous
moon, we occasionally unfurl enough to
stretch and throw out a net to see
what we might catch from the deeps
of the existential sea of uncertainty
waving at each other as if across a vast
expanse of distance and time.

We throw ourselves overboard, down in to the deep,
to survey the night’s catch of silvery fish
and delicate strands of life
from where the unseen, simply felt, swell and drop of the ocean,
lulls us along,
the catch streaming through my fingers;
gossamer threads that I weave and loop and knit together,
the art and science in a pre-verbal loom
that shuttles back and forth.
Circular motion approaching the zone of instability and disorientation,
where what was inside is now out and so on.
An inversion and return of life to the self
where we are the weaver and the loom.
where what was opposite slowly comes together
in a unity of creation to produce and pronounce
that no longer must we divide to conquer
but instead weave and weave and weave
this matrix into a unified field.
No more fragmented but instead the loom of our fabric of existence.
It is in the way we weave together the art and science
that produces the medicine we need for our age.
Out of uncertainty comes the knowing of the mystery of life unfolding.
Naming ‘what is’, making connections, going down deep,
free us to behold what we are all engaged with
instead of pining for a far-off utopian horizon
at once transcendent mirage
and a binding of our consciousness.

The Science

The science behind the poem is based on Bohm’s assertion that we know through the assumption of difference; this creates fragmentation and zones of chaos. Wilson’s ideas on Consilience sees the fragmentation as an artefact of scholarship but acknowledges that the intersection of art and science can produce a zone of instability and disorientation. However, by connecting up the dots through compelling topics, such as suffering, the inherent unity of knowledge can be demonstrated. Knowing how to do this, how to think differently about art and science, provides some certainty. Wilson EO. 1998. Consilience: the unity of knowledge. London: Abacus.

The Poet

Wendy has just written a book on the art and science of medicine, drawing on the medical humanities, sociology and ideas about the suffering self. Using suffering and existential crises to provide a portal for consilience at the deep level of self, we are required to grapple with these issues, to be able to name what we are involved with, in order to be able to see the inherent unity of art and science. That exploring by and through uncertainty we can become to know beyond the usual rhetoric. Wendy lives in London and teaches medical sociology and medical education.

Next poem: Variant of Uncertain Significance by Cass Barrett