Eco-Kantian Thoughts on the Nature of Experience of Nature

The poem circles round the notation, more like a sandwich with a filling of self-quotation. The frame in David Kachinski "A Reflection on Experience in the Natural World" invokes the sound of a Chrysler speeding through the night. But any man-made sound could suit the argument ...

I take up my pen and I write:
"Nature is necessarily what connects us to past generations. Aside from all-eclipsing moments of extreme fear and pure pleasure, the only experiences which can be said to be reasonably close to those of someone who has lived fifty, or two-hundred, or three-thousand years ago, are those of one alone in Nature, where there is no sign of civilization whatsoever (civilization has changed too much, too quickly, but while we have altered Nature, her essential forces remain as they always have). These experiences are rare and ephemeral indeed. A plane passing silently overhead or the groan of a distant engine are enough to remind one of their tenuous place —"

from Traffic Cone Quarterly No. 1

And so for day 1615
16.05.2011