The Serpent's Eye

'One bad apple can rot a whole barrel'
is a medeavil  phrase that reflects a simpler
approach to the mysteries of the world.
That for the want of seeing mystery remains intact.

What rots apples is not the first apple,
but how the fruit is stored.
It is not merely that poor housing
starts the rot, or even that the first to rot
will be the first of many.
It is that both decay and virtue
hide how they are formed.
Unseen, they create their own consistency.

Thus the problem with the fruit
from the tree of knowledge
was not with the fruit itself,
nor it's apparent ripeness
or the lack of preparedness
of the intended recipients,
but with how the gaderene rush
became the light in the serpent's eye
when it knew how power in one person
reinforces shame in another, degrading both
as if they were the first form of  perpetual motion.