The Blink of an Eye

[MHenry]

The Blink of an Eye

From a distance, a mosaic of color
As if looking through a prism
Over a dark, vast and starry background
Holding secrets of millenniums past
Never to be known by humankind

A tiny piece of an infinite space
Incomprehensibly far away
Created by a supreme being
Or the inevitable clash of unknowable forces
Destined forever to attract and repel

Now, peering back, back, back in time
Through ancient shafts of light
Now, detecting strange new objects
Through wobbles, flickers, and ripples
Looking back to the moment of creation

Objects billions of times brighter
More massive than our sun
Unexplained phenomenon
Celestial bodies defying physics
Einstein's theories proved right again

Particles - elusive, infinitesimally small
Discovered in high speed collisions
The building blocks of life
Scattered about the universe
In the hearts and tails of comets

The secrets of the human genome
Uncovered and spliced
3d printers, proteins and amino acids
Programmed to print embryos remotely
Pick a size, a shape, a color

Pay in Bitcoin, or use Applepay
Sorry, we've been hacked
A hostile foreign government
Has your genome, your social security number
And the proceeds of your bank accounts

Odds are, humankind
Is not the first intelligent species
To inhabit the universe
Odds are, it won't be the last
A blink of an eye and we are gone

[graydon archer]

This is an awe inspiring write MHenry! To say we were the first, the only, and the last, are merely opinions formed by those intellectuality incapable of inductive reasoning.

[MHenry]

Thank you, graydon. I appreciate your valuable feedback and the time you invest to read and remark.
Thank you for the 'like" Suz-zen!

[pipersfancy]

Lovely exploration of unknown and unknowable truths... (And... I think Einstein most definitely came from an advanced Alien race...)

[grant hayes]

It does. Thank you for introducing me to it!!

[MHenry]

Hi, pipersfancy,

I found Murmurings and I love it! You open with a description of what I interpret as either pre-Big Bang, or just after the Big Bang. You move to the personal, the longing to be more than we are, but to remain ourselves, then you take us back to the primordial goo where we emerge fish-like only to gaze up at the incomprehensible cosmic void from which we came in our fleeting existence. It's a sweeping lyrical epic told in short pungent bursts. Thanks for sending me there!

[pipersfancy]

Ah! You got it! Thanks for the reading MHenry!

[Brainwreck]

Whoa, I do love this poem and understand it much better, although so much of
it is unexplained. They have just recently found new state of matter. It has been hypothesized for 40 years. "quantum spin liquid" into smaller
quasiparticles. Also called Majorana fermions . Scientist and computer
gurus think they will harness it for quantum computer. The rest is over
my head.
And I love the starry background through a prism.

[MHenry]

HI, Brainwreck, I must read about that. Sounds cool! Thanks for letting me know.

[Tanner]

Lovely write! Particularly like the title and of course the last line. 99% of all species that have ever lived are defunct. Humankind - thoughtful scientists now give our species about 300 more years
given our penchant for self-destruction of the planet. I am confident that elsewhere there is a carbon-based intelligence who would smile at our stupidities...As Brainwreck rightly surmises, the more scientists delve down into matter particles get smaller and smaller...Just like the universe - no end in sight, down deep or out there!

[MHenry]

Hi, Tanner, Thank you for your encouragement. I had written this earlier in the year, but after one of our exchanges, I decided to post it. The interesting thing to me about the "Big Bang," is that there could have been billions of "Big Bangs" before this one; just one more "Big Bang" in an endless repetition of attract and repel. Thus, making us even more insignificant in the relative scheme of things than we already are.

[Mullin]

A very interesting read and unique take on the theme of community!!!
When I think of a planet full of humans as just one community, I begin to realize the full meaning behind the phrase "it's a small world after all."
I wonder what beings far in the future will make of Applepay, lol.

[MHenry]

Hi, Mullin, Thanks for reading and your thoughtful comment.

The future beings might say...
Being 1: "They work all day for their meager pay, then spend it all on ebay with Applepay! What were they thinking?! And that planet! What a mess!"
Being 2: " Yeah, right?!"

[bobby]

Oh, my goodness, as I fall into a meditative stare -- that is to say, my eyes are wide open with tears welling as if trying to unblock negative chi -- trying my best not to blink! This piece instantly unharnessed my thoughts enough to allow me to go "far out" on the journey (and certainly well beyond this past week's platter of humdrum!) Way to go, as you undeniably lit up possibilities right before our eyes! Beautiful!

[MHenry]

Thank you for reading my poem and commenting, bobby. I am glad you enjoyed it!

[lunar glide]

i enjoyed this. science and poetry are two of my favorite things to think about and this was both. thank you for posting this

[MHenry]

Thank you for visiting and reading my poem, lunar glide. It is nice to know long buried words can be unearthed again!