Chance Process and Falling Angel, Rising Ape
Elizabeth Barrette
Chance Process
A sample of 1
Is not sufficient
To extrapolate
Statistics.
We say that “water is life”
But it could as easily be ammonia.
We breathe oxygen,
But to the anaerobic bacteria – relics
Of an ancient Earth – it is poison.
Our bodies are based on carbon,
But silicon could serve
The same purpose, even to
Computing consciousness.
The universe would have to work hard
To make something stranger than
A duck-billed platypus,
That egg-laying mammal;
A tube-worm beside a black smoker,
Growing with neither mouth nor anus;
A Venus’ flytrap, the most famous
Ant-eating plant on Earth
But there are stars beyond counting
And in an infinite set, even the unlikely
Becomes inevitable.
How strange could life get while
Still remaining life? We can guess
But we won’t really know
Until we go see for ourselves,
Until we dare to
Talk to strangers.
Falling Angel, Rising Ape
Time unravels, as if from a spool of tape,
Teasing humanity with its potent prize
Where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
Silver stars button down; deep space furls its cape.
Engines shake the clouds with their cherubic cries.
Time unravels. As if from a spool of tape,
Images spill into an unstable shape.
Weeping in awe and fear, we cover our eyes
Where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
The rocket surges upward, seeking escape
Velocity. Can sheerest triumph capsize
Time? Unraveling, as if from spools of tape,
They open, mighty pinions of steel and crepe.
The ship ascends – seraph in machined disguise –
Where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
Once, even the scientists would laugh and jape
At dreams of reaching C, but today, surprise!
Time unravels, as if from a spool of tape,
Where the falling angel meets the rising ape.
Photo "Feed Us" by Bella Dante.
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Poems Copyright © 2007 Elizabeth Barrette. All rights reserved.
Photo Copyright © 2007 Bella Dante. All rights reserved.
