IS THE SPEED OF THE LIGHT THE BEAUTY OF THE LIGHT

 

Is the speed of the light the beauty of the light

Or is light more than speed

Is curve less than angle and angle nothing

Is the sorrow of love more than need

Is the light of the speed the question

Then must we bear all things heavily

On earth and be circumscribed by logic only

by the mere measurements as if to say

The measurement holds superior sway

And for this men win prizes hold chairs at institutes valued

over anything that can be felt, as in far dimensions, discerned

dreamed, heralded by the angelic where what is learned

cannot proceed

oh look for life where there is no gravity if you please

it hardly matters to me if

the beauty of the speed or of the light agree

but I love

the light in the heaviness of darkness revealed

where the comfort of the light is singing even weighed down

in measureless flights fairytale ascending to those

counted as insignificant if registering at all there the light

is singing to me with tears streaming down

Into the equations which break apart

And cannot yield what is expected but miraculous

The miraculous enters in then a charged infinity like the art

Of Callas singing vissi d’arte

and how then can I break mere surf on the horizon into particles and waves

but something else

I cannot tell you I cannot describe cried the mermaid in Hans Andersen’s story

not my own glory but something else survives

not washed over by the tides in a sea of blue green negation but

where the light does not bind me

my heart to speed as if to an unfailing metronome, colorless ratio

the pert jeweled nightingale with its predictable inevitable music

or to do anything other

than to be in order to sing in reply to the beauty of the Light

however rudimentary I may be

that God decreed is home

unassailed by scientific precision

home and prisms and sunflowers, wherever shining is needed

the beauty of light the beauty of light the chlorophyll lightning of the trees, light lingering

on the child’s hair , reflected in the mirrors of the lakes

the dew on the grass of the isles once fair, returning

and concert song

surrounding the children with grace

causing the roses to bloom.

Christ, to rise in no disguise

as Very Light risen from death itself.

because Light proves unspokenly after all the sacrifice of Love and indissoluble.

mary angela douglas 17 november 2023

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1Mary Angela Douglas