Come and hear the strange report from Cloyne beside the sea
There’s nothing in the world at all unless a mind can see
The apple is its colour and its sweetness and its weight
Take those away and nothing’s left. There’s nothing left to take
Esse est Percipi, to be is to be perceived
To be is to perceive, and nothing lies between
The world is in the seeing, the world is in the seen
They say there’s something underneath, some matter down below
That holds the world together, but it’s something none can know
It has no sound, no size, no shape, no colour and no weight
So what is it you’re holding to? There’s nothing there to take
Esse est Percipi, to be is to be perceived
To be is to perceive, and nothing lies between
The world is in the seeing, the world is in the seen
Conceive a tree that’s standing in a park with none nearby
A book inside a closet where there isn’t any eye
It’s easy, so you tell me — but you framed it in your head
The one perceiving was yourself. It’s you. It’s you instead
I don’t deny reality, I never said it’s gone
The rock, the tree, the fire, the book, I grant them, every one
I take away no table and I take away no floor
I take the empty nothing they had hidden it before
Your ideas arrive unbidden, they are not the things you willed
They come so strong and orderly, so steady and so filled
So another mind is holding them, and holding me and you
A Spirit everywhere at once, and seeing all the way through
Esse est Percipi, to be is to be perceived
To be is to perceive, and nothing lies between
The world is in the seeing, the world is held and seen
When I close my eyes the table’s standing right there in the room
Another spirit sees it, and it never leaves the gloom
There is no other substance in the world except a mind
Believe your senses
Believe your senses
To be is to be perceived. There’s nothing in between