Beyond Sirius
“[T]he success of quantum mechanics forces us to accept that the electron, a constituent of matter that we normally envision as occupying a tiny, pointlike region of space, also has a description involving a wave that, to the contrary, is spread through the entire universe. . . .”
– Brian Greene, The Fabric of the Cosmos
This is the origin of despair.
Damn Heisenberg, but
it is necessary to be some-
where. The heart is no
hunter, it is prey
seeking a snug nest
beneath the ever-
shifting stardust.
I remember chemistry class,
Mr. Button with his white shirt
peering through black horn rims
at the neatly-drawn
atomic solar system.
The atom was our friend then,
it beat the Japs, powered the
Nautilus, and held out the
promise of a perpetual
Disneyland.
Electrons circled the nucleus
in neat elliptical orbits
sketched in with the
same bold strokes that
made Mickey Mouse
invincible.
No speck ever suddenly disappeared
to the dark side of the moon.
Eisenhower
was too serious
to drop his putter
and rematerialize
a parsec or so beyond
Sirius.
Or so we believed.
What did we know?
That which we held dearest
was already
gone.
The unease now
so pervasive;
is it the cold pull
of uncertainty
on jittery bones?