Published by Associate Editor on February 24, 2015. This item is listed in Issue 25, Issue 25 Poetry, Poetry

Equations of a Sonata

regarding string theory

Another me
in that time and place
was in sync with you.

Now we move
in different dimensions.

I’m certain
there’s an equation,

an everything-in-the-universe equation,
that explains all.

Newton’s apple falls,
I’m no longer there
to catch it.

Don’t mourn me.

Resonance of the universe
is a cello string

a soloist playing Beethoven,

I’m dancing.

Calculate it

a million ways—
on moving fingers,
the click of an abacus

peer through thick glasses
at an engineer’s slide rule,
check his pocket calculator,
write a program for your laptop,
download an app for your i-pad.

The universe keeps spinning,
life unwinds.

Deborah P Kolodji served as president of the Science Fiction Poetry Association. She is the moderator of the Southern California Haiku Study Group and currently serves as the California Regional Coordinator for the Haiku Society in America. She has published over 800 poems in journals such as Star*Line, Strange Horizons, the Magazine of Speculative Poetry, Mythic Delirium, Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Acorn, the Heron’s Nest, A Hundred Gourds, Rattle, Pearl, and poeticdiversity. She has published four chapbooks of poetry, including one of speculative haiku, “Red Planet Dust” in 2007. She has been anthologized in the Rhysling Anthology, the Red Moon Anthology, Dwarf Stars, Aftershocks: The Poetry of Recovery, Haiku 21, and Lighting the Global Lantern: A Teacher’s Guide to Writing Haiku and Related Forms. Her short stories have appeared in THEMA, Tales of the Talisman, and Everyday Weirdness. She has a memoir in Chicken Soup for the Dieter’s Soul. Her radio interview with Lois P. Jones on the Poet’s Café, which aired in Los Angeles in 2010, can be heard on the Timothy Green’s Blog: http://www.timothy-green.org/blog/deborah-p-kolodji/

Tags: Deborah Kolodji