The Breathless Pause
by Moyra Caldecott
Published by Mushroom eBooks at Smashwords
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Copyright © 1989 Moyra Caldecott
Moyra Caldecott has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, to be identified as the Author of this work.
First published in 1989, Gothic Image Publications, United Kingdom
First ebook edition published in 2007 by Mushroom eBooks
This
ePub edition published in 2012 by Mushroom eBooks,
an imprint of
Mushroom Publishing, Bath, BA1 4EB, United
Kingdom
www.mushroom-ebooks.com
Also available in paperback (ISBN 978-1-84319-450-7)
All rights reserved. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
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Contents
NATURE AND PLACES ON THE PLANET
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Dare Darkness Grab Us
Shivering
on a very small earth,
the night sky
formidable
with
stars,
we pull the comforting blanket
of our love
over
us,
and,
curled together,
dare Darkness grab us
and Time
scatter us.
Full Moon
Sleeping
with
the silver disk
of the full moon
on my forehead...
light
shining
through the thick bone.
Watch how it glints
on
mind-mirrors,
Scatters shadows,
and seeks at last,
the tiny
seed-thought
that waits for birth.
New Moon
Seeing
that hair-line
of flexed silver
in the frail green sky
of
evening,
I exult.
God Watches Man
God
watches man.
Man pulls earth shawl
around him
webbing
himself with shadow.
Eclipse Of The Moon
The
first men
witnessing
this bronze ball
rolling across the
sky
must have feared
the vengeance of the gods.
But we,
in
an Age of Science,
alone on this hill,
know better.
The
stars are myriad,
but still the dark between them
unsettles
us.
We who are dying
hope that Science
has left some secrets
unresolved,
and, against all odds,
our death will be
among
trumpets and cheering angels,
even our sins of
omission
forgiven
by a smiling God.
The Hubble Telescope
The
Hubble telescope
has changed my perception
of the
universe.
When I look out
on a dark night
my mind sees
more
than my eye...
Comet
A
fist of cloud
limited to earth
hid
the giant traveller
from
another galaxy.
And I
crouched
in my bed
surrounded
by
small things
saw nothing of the splendour
of its journey
nor
heard
its distant
thundering.
Black Hole
It
was a shock
to realise
a black hole
was at the centre
of
MY galaxy...
A spiralling wheel of light
being drawn into
a
dense mystery
from which nothing can escape.
A black dot
as
heavy as the earth,
a full stop
marking the end
of
everything I know.
Binary Star
A
white dwarf
and a neutron star
circle each other
every
eleven minutes,
28,000 light years from earth.
Eleven
minutes
while I talk to Rachel
on the phone.
Celestial Music
I
read in the Scientific American
that scientists had discovered
the
sun “rang like a bell”,
constantly heaving with nuclear
reactions,
and remembered the “celestial music of the
spheres”
Medieval poets wrote about.
One evening of
starlight
a friend played me a tape
of the sounds recorded
by
one of the Voyager space probes
as it travelled the
Universe...
Strange hummings and harmonies,
eerie and
beguiling...
Today I heard
that the Kalahari San
People
were asked by Laurens van der Post
what made them make
music.
“Have you not heard the stars sing?”
They replied,
puzzled.
On listening to astronomers speculate on the origins of the Universe...
Whether
there is,
or is not,
a Multiverse
of which our vast
Universe
is only a small part...
Whether a billion
mysterious
singularities
exploded all on one day
or on others, at
random...
Whether they are still exploding
as I drink my
tea...
These questions
make my heart beat faster.
Beyond my
front door
I see
a boundless
and magnificent
Infinity.
Under African Skies
I
miss the stars
of Southern Africa
more than the land
itself.
the Milky Way
a thousand times more bright
to my
child’s eye,
than this I see in old age
in the Northern
Hemisphere.
Not dwarfed then, I,
but a giant
turning a
great wheel of stars
around my head.
Now I have shrunk
and
only a few stars
prick the darkness
of the sky.
Supernova: Crab Nebula Photographing Memory
In
1054 a Chinese astronomer
observed a star exploding in the
sky.
Today we have photographed
the filaments of gas and
dust
that day the star thrust out
at thousands of kilometres
per second.
But whether the floating debris,
the nebulous
mist,
the pulsing neutron star
at its centre,
are still
there,
we do not know.
The camera is not as subtle
as
the mind
which can encompass
a multi-dimensional picture
of
the explosion,
before and after
and to come...
The
whence
and wherefore
and the why...
Galaxies
There
are a thousand galaxies
in the constellation of Virgo
covering
a region of at least
10 million light years across.
Billions
more in the universe as a whole.
Giant vortices
and spirals of
burning stars
driven by unimaginable forces...
Carried away by
the expansion of space
through many dimensions...
And us
—
with them.
Ring Nebula
In
its death throes
an exploding star
pulses out energy,
gas
and dust.
A red tide
engulfs
nearby stars and
planets...
Travels outwards
swallowing
dark matter
and
galaxies...
Rolling
inexorably
towards the Earth.
I
shut my door
To keep it out.
Eternity
Eternity
cannot
be measured
by the rotation
of stars.
It is measureless...
A
point
where everything
is simultaneous
and has no
beginning
and no end.
Proof
Astronomers
calculate
the presence
of a celestial body
by noting
its
influence
on those around it.
Why do we want
more proof
than this
for the existence
of the divine?
Communication
If
the two parts
of a split sub-atomic particle
can
communicate
across great distances,
and human twins
can feel
each other’s pain,
it is quite clear
that we know very
little
about how the real world works.
Betelgeuse
The
supergiant star
Betelgeuse,
a thousand times the size
of our
sun,
dominates the constellation Orion.
What planets
swing
around
its vast furnace
waiting for extinction
when it goes
supernova?
What child looks up
believing its sun
is a
friendly one?
Joker
If
the multi-verse
were a billion times the size
and the
magnificence,
it would still be
only matter.
Why do we
feel
there is a joker in the pack
that changes everything?
Saturn (The Roman name for Chronos — the god of Time)
Time
swallows its children
regurgitating them
as dust.
So
Saturn
whirls its rings
triumphantly...
All changed
and
charged
with beauty...
Haloes of light
round a majestic
planet.
Venus
We
thought
the Greeks
chose so well
in naming their gods
that
we
stole the names
for our planets.
Venus,
“The
morning star”,
is associated with the goddess
of Love and
Beauty.
the seductress,
the mistress,
the
lover.
Actually
the planet is
a hellish furnace
of
volcanic activity,
constantly drizzling
deadly sulphur dioxide
rain.
Mars
Mars
—
a defeated warrior
deeply scarred and scored...
Scoured
by mighty rivers
long since lost...
Stalked now
by dust
devils
and red dust storms
planet wide.
We probe its
surface
with long fingers.
Even a microbe found
would
comfort us
who fear
to be alone.
Hereford Cathedral
Sun,
Moon, and Stars
revolve in a fragment of Medieval glass,
a
tribute to those scholars
in the twelfth century
who designed
astrolabes
and played with cosmic numbers...
never
dreaming
that their tentative steps
would one day lead man
to
walk on the Moon
and discover other planets
orbiting other
stars
in other galaxies.
NATURE AND PLACES ON THE PLANET
While I was wasting the day
While
I was wasting the day
the grass was growing,
daisies
opening,
sunflowers
pushing up tall stems.
While I was
wasting the day
the bee pushed its way
into a hundred
foxgloves
and went home tired.
Now the light fades.
The
rain wets my hair.
I smell honey-suckle and musk-rose
and take
a deep breath
for tomorrow.
Spring
The
whole green underworld is on the move.
Fists of bracken
rise
for green power,
banners of tulip
proclaim the Sun’s
hour.
All stirring, whirring nature leaves
the ground
and
pushes up
and out.
The forces of the City
in their dark
towers
are under siege
and every concrete playground
has
infiltrating green.
The buttercup sneaks up behind
the tarmac
in the car park,
grass grows on roofs
and spilled Budgie
seed
becomes a meadow on a window sill.
Praise be for such
a revolution!
I’d fight with them
to topple every tower of
faceless office down,
till every man
and woman, child,
had
space on earth
to grow at least
one leaf.
Garden at evening
Out
of darkening green
comes lupin light
and the blue flame of
delphinium
and iris.
Roses fold light
into
themselves,
petal on petal,
until the centre
glows.
Trees
gather shadows
around them
like cloaks,
settling tired
birds
into silence.
The moth shakes its wings.
I
hold breath
hoping to see
the Presence I can feel...
catch
the swish of feet
in the Long grass...
the brush of
shoulder
against leaves.
A good day
London
slides past.
I pick out the bits I want
and throw away the
rest.
Everywhere I tread
diamonds spring up.
Dawn
When
I looked out at dawn today
the clouds were threaded
with
filaments of copper
and red gold.
As I turned my head away
and
looked back again
a moment later,
the clouds were dull and
grey.
How fast the glory fades...
but in that brief flush
it
has lit the soul...
and, sometimes,
memory can replay it
when
it is needed
on a dark day.
Spring in Cambridge
Spring
in Cambridge
is all old stone
and new leaves...
Trees
shaking off tired thoughts...
bud and bough rich
with sunlight
and bird call.
Cambridge in Spring
is all bells
and
choirs
ringing and singing...
willows like skeins
of green
silk,
and lawns
so fine
only dreams
may walk of them.