The Wondermental Things Apply
Below is a poem I wrote for yesterday’s Saturday Live on
The wondermental things apply
as quirky quantum time goes by
it’s quirky and it’s quarky
and it’s kind of like a doorkey
to a world so charmed and murky
only physicists can visit it
and handle its vicissitudes
it is a most absorbing thing
to watch electrons orbiting
to sit there and imagine them
without a hope of catching them
the fundamental particles
like toilet rolls and smarticles
they’re smaller than bacteria
but in no way inferior
though they occupy less area
they’re infinitely eerier
and scarier
so much that even physicists
can hardly grasp that they exist
they have ‘non-local’ properties
exist as probabilities
as possibles and parallels
as parables and dizzy spells
a neo-nano-nothingness
attention-seeking emptiness
an absence with an aftertaste
a ripple in a state of grace
for some the sub-atomic’s
both a riddle and a tonic
east of reason, shy of rhyme
the quantum world confirms that time
is circular and cyclical
on top of that it speaks of why
the wondermental things apply
as quarky quantum time goes by…
January 22nd, 2008 at 4:54 pm
i love this! its reassuringly amazing & amusing - Thanx Matt
January 22nd, 2008 at 7:41 pm
An excellent example of art-meets-science. I shall use it in my A level Physics lessons, if that’s OK.
I’d be delighted if you use it in your Physics lessons, Barrie - cheers, Matt
January 25th, 2008 at 9:12 am
many thanks Matt for directing me to this, tis a great poem. have you done any other science based poems? thanks, or as we say by ‘ere, diolch yn fawr, yvette xx
thanks Yvette, I haven’t done many science poems, but I did write “Hypothetical Love Poem” and an information technology poem called “Bit Byte Kilobyte”. They’re both in my recent collection available from my website (click on Shop) or, if you’re interested but not that interested, e-mail me and I’ll send you a copy.
Matt x