Metrical Experiments by Gerard Lally

Metrical Experiments

I. Alcaic

The Geiger counter clicks every now and then. Atomic changes happen from time to time. A thousand million chance events draw Pictures impressive and stark, but not “sane”.

Endangered logic struggles to grasp the new Result of scientific research and thought. We peer by light of day with blind eyes, Quantum mechanics the guide we must trust.

One unsound cat, the Schrödinger kind, that is Dead and alive, until one explores its state, Cat-form of Hegel’s dialectic, Raises the question: is this the “real” world?

The Geiger counter registers one more click. Plane polarisers filter the gentle light, But we, who can’t make sense of such things, Stumble through shadows of night, all star-struck.

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II. Sapphic

Sappho, Sappho! No one can hear you calling wayward lovers, lost to you now forever. We are lately seventeen turning eighteen; mere lads and lasses.

Lesbos, Lesbos! Gone is your former glory, island haven, scene of a migrant crisis. Fled are Gaia, Cybele, Aphrodite. Everything passes.

Gerard Lally

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