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Amber Paulen

Stardust

17 August 2010

         

As I read Our Cosmic Habitat by Martin Rees I am confronted again and again by the miraculous inherent in our universe. Though this is a book to dispel miracles by scientific explanations, my head, leaning to the side of poet, refuses the order of tight definitions. I catch phrases, ideas and images blossom.

Like this one: …our universe is governed by laws that are puzzlingly biophilic. “Life!” shouts Henry Miller, “Always life first and last!” How did such an infinitesimal planet hovering amongst such vast and relatively empty spaces burgeon to such a wonderfully prolific life-giver? Who would have guessed it? The Lord said let there be life and stars blew. Atoms are never wasted but reused, occasionally binding into something bigger.

Now, over 400 extrasolar planets are known to exist and these are mainly the big ones; thousands of galaxies are in a piece of sky the size of a salt grain held at arm’s length. We are all stardust. It is now impossible to deny our connection between all that is animate and inanimate. It is impossible to walk without benevolence for this ride around our Sun. If the daily machinations of human society didn’t make much sense before, it’s makes even less sense looking up. For light years all around we have been given days, carbon and oxygen, to not squander them.

I am stardust. My body regenerated out of ancient matter. The other night when I looked up I saw Andromeda and a galaxy bouncing on her knee. I watched comet dust extinguish into an orange flare, a Perseid, and Perseus rose from the cradle between the black hills while the cows rang their bells and a bird screamed. I am as much everything as everything is a part of me.

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Commentary for Stardust

        

1 On Monday 23 August 2010 carolyn manney wrote:

i’d be happy to be one of your readers. send it my way…..

                 

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