Please note that the poems and essays on this site are copyright and may not be reproduced without the author's permission.


Thursday 4 November 2010

Lines Found in Logbook at Astronomical Observing Station


.

http://www.spacetelescope.org/static/archives/images/wallpaper1/opo0331a.jpg

Turbulent region of swirling gas and dust near eruptive star Eta Carinae in Carina Nebula, between two large clusters of some of the most massive and hottest known stars in the universe: Hubble Space Telescope image by NASA/ESA and Hubble Heritage team (AURA/STScl), 2002 (NASA)



In the night the pure chamber expanded
into the pure sphere, and the pure sphere dissolved in
the black forms, and the black forms became cloudy
elements in this chamber, backlit
by the glow from an expiring star
whose light was borrowed from a sister
star, even in the same moment being born;
and so the whole romance juddered on
while remaining untouchable, nameless,
a kind of hypnosis filled with objects
a simple snap of the fingers might have
dispelled, had there been fingers,
had the black forms dwindled again
to dots, and had the larger shape crouching
in the corner of the pure chamber shown itself.




http://www.spacetelescope.org/static/archives/images/screen/heic0206d.jpg

Centre of Swan Nebula (M17) in constellation Sagittarius: Hubble Space telescope image by NASA, Holland Ford (JHU), and the ACS Science Team, 2002 (NASA)

4 comments:

manik sharma said...

tom,
beautiful imagery....the romance is palpable ....
at the risk of pointing to a stranger course of events that i related to when i read this , you post this on the eve of the president's visit to our nation....we are in a constellation....the shining ones...the so called to be powers and superpowers....and the romance 'carriers' are preparing their best suits....
its that time of the year i guess....love is in the air......

tke cre

TC said...

Well, Manik, much as out there in the great universe the cloudy symbols of high romance come and go as stars are born and expire beyond our mortal ken, less far away the temporary romance of this country with this president, like a child's infatuation with a toy, now appears to have spent itself also, leaving his name mired in the kind of casual opprobrium often assigned in this nation's history to sacrificial victims.

Which is why it is a relief to see that on Puri Beach, Orissa, though buried up to his neck in sand, he is still able to keep smiling.

STEPHEN RATCLIFFE said...

Tom,

Thanks for all these --- "had the larger shape . . . shown itself" ---


11.5

light coming into fog against invisible
ridge, black shapes of leaves on branch
in foreground, sound of wave in channel

that some corresponds to it,
toward in the form of

this being so close to that,
looks itself, is that

silver line of sun reflected in channel,
whiteness of gull flapping toward point

TC said...

Steve,

Something must correspond to, or with it. This is a kind of natural law.