space

DARWIN 4

I like
to think of myself
of a Victorian naturalist
shot out
of a cannon
into the future
through
space and time into
distant and
bizarre
Goldilocks Zone

to find
myself
taking a stroll like
Imperial British Gentlemen

walking on the
surface of an
alien planet
they
happened to
name after me

freshly equipped with
all my conversions

retractable legs, compound
eyes, downloaded intelligence
and full
hover capabilities
carrying me across the
needle-spine badlands,
the acid seas and lakes
of mercury

looking for
the planet’s raw nerve,
scouring every niche
for signs of
life, impending
intelligence,
hints of the biological

foundations of
new civilizations and
their
inevitable cities
of deep, incandescent pain.

COLONY

there is no
absolute space

distance
is relative

watch me
before your
very eyes

wrinkle up
into a chrysalis

emerge at the end
of the day (my
long night)
steel-winged sharp
ready
to fly

and you so
spaced-out
you readily
comprehend

if only you might let
me search, find your button,
switch to
transformation

together we could soar
without end; without end

ICARUS INSTINCT

I barged into
the temple of
artificial intelligence

stormed out
after dismantling and
indeed liberating
a host of automatic
telling
and vending machines

flew up to the firmament
with the eye for aeronautics
of an ancient Daedalus
deluxe

soaring Sun-ward like his son
determined that the destiny
should be
becoming child
of the cosmos beyond which
no sense to aspire.

COUPLED

COUPLED

be careful
what you
wish for

imagination
coupled
with
distance

is such
a killer

the creature of
my dreams
was
so different
strange, alluring
utterly unique and
exotic

sadly
she is
light years distant
in space
and time

her species across
the galaxy on a
distant
epic planet

however
you do spin it,

her species not having
begun to
truly evolve yet

at least in a direction
I would extremely like

MANDATE

MANDATE

we combed
the galaxy

looking for protein

searching for
wonderful, strange, intelligent,
civilized moral beings

scoured the cosmos
every chink
and crevice

beings that
as is
our mandate

we might colonize
eat
and kill

EQUATION

EQUATION

energy
is mass

and space
and time
are
money

me
I wasted my
time
studying
philosophy
writing poetry

so can tell
your what’s-the-
matter
moment is
pure
postmodern
spiritual existential

ennui of life in a
post material age

nobody
offers a phosopher
a penny for
his
a shilling for
her thoughts

or to speak
the value or meaning
of anything these
days

just nowhere
for the human
mind to expand

and all
that wasted
storage space