The Electron at the Edge of the Universe
Image: Lawrence Rayner/Flickr
Sometimes a poem speaks better than prose. If you are interested in the science that the poem refers to, you can find the resource here.
Enjoy!
The Electron at the Edge of the Universe
have you heard of the ragged-eyed theoretical physicist
who guided a mathematical scalpel through space and time
to attempt to extract uncertainty from all prediction?
he began the operation with an idealized billiard table
and set about predicting the exact trajectory of each ball after each collision.
he then handed sir isaac newton, the grand knight of Empire, the formula-forged cue.
after the first collision, the gentle ball glided in a blissful line of predictability.
the second met the third.
while isaac strained even more with the fourth,
it was the fifth that had him staggering.
on the sixth collision, the Imperial Knight uttered his last gasp of math
and collapsed on the spot.
the physicist picked up the cue on the seventh
and in a flourish of virtuosity
stood on isaac’s body and maintained his accuracy
by calculating the gravitational fields of the people standing near the table.
and so the complexity grew.
and the math relentlessly pushed accurate prediction
deeper and further into the chaotic bowels of the universe.
it was the fiftieth collision where the probing surgeon of Everything realized
that, to go further, he needed to know the exact location
of every particle in the universe.
with certainty, he saw that the movement of one electron
at the edge of the known universe
taking a right instead of a left
would significantly affect everything on the table.
When the physicist finally looked up from his equations,
he realized himself consumed
by the very bowels he was cutting—
caught directionless in Indra’s net.
he like moses in the old stories—
after witnessing the shadow of God—
went mad and raving for forty days and nights.
And here you sit
with your human body:
you are a billiard table with thirty-seven trillion balls on it
all colliding at once,
while the table collides with every other table in the Universe.
your conscious mind is a five-foot-long billiard cue
and your perception only allows you to see six inches of the table
at any given moment.
and you want to figure out the exact reason you’re depressed
or why you’re not sleeping right
or why your lover’s eyes light up more for something on the screen
than they do for your shirtless body
or what kind of practice you can do
twice a day
that will eradicate the grief
of fifteen thousand years of domestication
in your ancient, untamed body.
Let go.
you are mostly everything.
being moved.
as you trust fall through Life
guide the one tiniest speck of control
you have ever been granted:
bring your attention into the now
and choose to notice the good seeds already inside of you.
follow the impulse to be kind to the next living being you lay eyes on
even when it is not kind back.
let yourself come alive by praising something out loud
that you have been taking for granted.
accidentally stumble upon the beauty and worthiness inside of you.
forget how to read
. and let your eyes wander from the page
into the wonder of the Universe that is right in front of you.
You are the electron at the edge of everything else’s universe.
Matthew Fogarty
April 2022
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