Cosmic Gall

Neutrinos, they are very small.
They have no charge and have no mass
And do not interact at all.

The earth is just a silly ball
To them, through which they simply pass,
Like dustmaids down a drafty hall
Or photons through a sheet of glass.

They snub the most exquisite gas,
Ignore the most substantial wall,
Cold-shoulder steel and sounding brass,
Insult the stallion in his stall.

And, scorning barriers of class,
Infiltrate you and me! Like tall
And painless guillotines, they fall
Down through our heads into the grass.

At night, they enter at Nepal
And pierce the lover and his lass
From underneath the bed—you call
It wonderful; I call it crass.

John Updike
Telephone Poles and Other Poems, 1963


In honor of a writer I’ve always admired, I offer my own version, treating the same topic and employing a similarly random rhyme scheme.

Updike-like

Neutrinos are all quite minute.
Along with mass they have no weight,
and through all substances they shoot,
unhampered, at a rapid rate.

A headlong gallop is their gait
They never pause but always scoot,
maintaining an unruffled state
though Satan were in hot pursuit.

Through concrete block and armor plate
and through the entire globe to boot
they blow like wind through iron grate
not deviating from their route.

Their nature’s subject to debate
though as they pass we should salute.
They give no hint, remaining mute,
and rush, unstopping, toward their fate.

I wonder, should we give a hoot
or let such queries sit and wait
while sober scholars ruminate
and worlds grow cold and questions moot?

Greg Kagan
2005

As promised, the next two blog entries will address poetry and marketing.