__________________________________________
Ours is the physics of decay,
of entropy and of chaos --
the fate that awaits
the collapse of dying stars.
Would that we could measure
all our twists and rebounds
by the angles we sweep
into the infinite midnight.
As a quark and a lepton
pirouette through time
each unaware one another
perfects God’s exacting plan,
so too do we often ignore
the urgent movements
by which aureate suns
implode with weighty surrender.
Vectors to catseyes of emerald --
propulsions to clusters of diamond -- each are invisible arrows
borne with indeterminate cause.
Perhaps some geometries bank for loss,
or maybe whirl toward wonder;
I only know our immediate paths
accelerate to uneasy oblivion.
/
/
/
(C) 2006
The equation at the top of the poem is Einstein's alternate form for the gravitational field equations that underpin his general theory of relativity (i.e. the equations establishing the curvature of space and time that are the source for such scientific events as Black Holes and gravitational lenses).
The value Lambda represents the cosmological constant which Einstein believed was necessary to avoid a conclusion that the universe is expanding -- a value he later discarded when he learned of Hubble's empirical evidence of a red shift (and hence "Big Bang") to the universe. In the past decade, further observation of the possible accelerating expansion of the universe, which suggests more than just a Big Bang, has led many physicists to reconsider whether Einstein may originally have had the concept of a cosmological constant right after all. That is so because the constant is simply a real number and hence can be "positive" so as to produce negative energy that explains the acceleration.
That has nothing to do with this poem, however....
Still considering edits.
Bronze trophy winner
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