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      back together with its shadow.

      Imagine Earth

      as the nucleus of a hydrogen atom

      from which we’re looking out — hoping

      for a glimpse of the single electron

      whirling around in its orbit

      and — like Neptune — simply too

      distant to see — a green pea

      in a green field a half-mile away.

      Now in confusion — now

      in a wave — a thousand blackbirds

      rise and veer above a stubble field —

      their wings like obsidian in the sun.

      Illusory solidity of the world

      and things — the chair I’m on —

      its atoms whizzing in arcs,

      repelling each other while I sit

      musing in this electromagnetic storm —

      a chair.

      So much space inside an atom,

      why can’t I reach through this wall?

      Is a honeybee

      one being, or an element

      of one being?

      Particles — shadows of waves

      in water moving over bright sand.

      As a child I witnessed a tiny sort of

      particle accelerator

      in the cold, blue light

      of The Lone Ranger

      on black-and-white TV — a beam

      of electrons through a cathode tube

      splayed out by a magnet to become

      Tonto and Silver crossing

      a phosphorescent screen.

      Every particle in their bodies represents

      the distillation of 100

      billion bits from the big bang that

      immolated themselves

      to become light.

      Now even quantum theory agrees,

      Form Is Emptiness — mostly.

      In the glittering domain

      of the Summer Triangle — buoyed up

      by crickets and frogs —

      Vega drags her rhomboid harp

      through an isthmus in the Milky Way.

      We need our quietest hours to hear Earth

      turning night into day —

      to feel it gather its waters against

      the pull of the moon —

      hydrogen holding the waters together,

      and we — made mostly of water —

      hydrogen molecules drawn to each other —

      wrapping up a bit of breathable

      air in their hydraulic embrace —

      holding me together, and you,

      with a little oxygen drawn in.

      How is it that an atom of hydrogen —

      the primary substance of all we know —

      can be said to weigh less

      than the sum of its parts,

      and does that mean the total mass

      of the known universe — mostly hydrogen —

      would weigh less if we could weigh it

      all together at once?

      Matter appears to be jealous of light —

      every particle mad to escape its mass

      to be just the light by which we

      see our world — without self —

      without the distractions of a you

      and me, apparently eternal

      like an electron — to have

      no substance in which to decay.

      The mysterious shore across the great void —

      a scary place from all you’ve heard,

      all you’ve imagined —

      never quite clearly in view,

      and no one you know

      has been there.

      And how will you endure your thoughts

      in the great dark absence

      of everything you’ve known?

      Like the terminals of the battery

      in a lamp,

      matter and antimatter

      cancel each other out

      to become light.

      Why anything at all should exist

      is a riddle we haven’t yet solved.

      Going and coming, the full moon

      and rising sun

      greet each other

      across the plane of the morning.

      “Till later,” says the moon.

      “I’ll be along,” says the sun.

      “I’ll be around,” says the earth.

      “Take your time.”

      Near the pole,

      the needle of the magnetic compass

      spins like drain water

      in its dying frenzy —

      finally so close to home.

      from THE REVENANT

      1971

      The Freeze

      During the night the wind shifted to the north

      thawing stopped

      and snow dust

      swirled across the frozen lake

      We pulled back into ourselves

      the horses were silent

      the air too brittle for sound

      The

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