Self-Awareness in the Modern Age
The sperm whale has the largest brain of anyone,
and John Lilly, a scientist, reckoned
it the greatest philosopher on Earth.
Of course, this was the Sixties
when god-whales and divine dolphins
were as common as female activists wishing to make love to them,
dressed in skin-tight leotards, mouths brightly rouged
to help the cetaceans read their lips up close. John
would invite them all in—scientists, women—to study
self-awareness,
stimulate the brains of dolphins, engage
in cortical mapping, see how human they are.
Intelligence
assuming humans as the standard,
which was confusing since U.S. Navy funds
helped build the facility where the military hoped to train
dolphins to carry bombs.
Ignoring his funders, John took LSD
suspended in a flotation tank, injected dolphins
with the hallucinogen to see if they too
might become enlightened. Or perhaps
already were, and were humoring us
along the way?
In response, two young males
—Delphi & Pan—
deliberately positioned themselves
in front of a large mirror suspended in water,
watched themselves pretend copulation,
doggy-style. Impeccable dolphin grins
just begging poor John to interpret
this slippery question of intelligence,
and enlightenment, and irony.