HYPOTHESIS 

Don’t pretend you don’t have one,

or brush it off

as a sound-a-like:

hypotenuse, hippopotamus

or hippocampus.

No one will be fooled.

Least of all you.

You got pockets full of ‘em,

like everybody.

Attics and arks worth.

This one is no crystal ball,

no decoder ring.

It’s just like the rest of 'em:

a ham among pigs,

a locust in a swarm.

Another thought among thoughts.

Don’t go polishing this or that one’s bald head.

Don’t cart any one of them around in a palanquin.

Don’t.

And do not treat one or another of them as currency,

‘cause you might just go broke,

ending up belly-up on a Black Tuesday,

or buried like Bernie

beneath your own Ponzi scheme.

Better just to get used to knowing that

a hypothesis is just a hypothesis.

If you can assume that position,

and commit to it down to your hippocampus,

well, then you’re free of triangulation.

Throw away the protractor, fuck the hypotenuse!

Send your assumption floating down the Zambezi.

It's just one more hippopotamus.