This site's design is only visible in a graphical browser that supports web standards, but its content is accessible to any browser or Internet device.

The Physicist at the Mall ť "The Pattern"

The Pattern

Imperfect memory: snowflakes
creating themselves in their own image
never get it exactly right.
So what you end up with are all these
pleasant approximations: this many points,
that much filigree betwixt,
but no matched pairs. The same
with leaves, their veins and serrate edges.
The same with smoke: the wisps
from twenty identical
votive candles at the shrine
are not identical; they remember only
a general way of rising, curling,
fading. What do you want?
Patterns that make you utter
surprise—nonlinear
plots, fractal
repetitions, Mandelbrot sets,
a template
in the chaotic
penetralia. A winter-white
landscape, its perfect
peace. Woodfires
coiling smoke up the chimney
this year, as in all the others.
In the spring, the leaves coming out
fleshy and soft on the branches
as if on cue, no two alike. You want
a miracle that knows its place: when to be
explicable, and when (your daughter
first stretching her mouth into a grin
you recognize as yours)
an utter surprise.

Copyright Š Janet Holmes 1994.

The Physicist at the Mall, Anhinga Press, 1994.
ISBN 0-938078-37-2. $10.00 paperback. 64 pages.
Order The Physicist at the Mall from Amazon.com!

Read another poem from The Physicist at the Mall:

"The Love of the Flesh"

Read reviews and comments on The Physicist at the Mall

Back to top