The universe ends where that thought originated

Aaron Tollefson

Dana Edmunds​

Newton never noted

that matter and energy

behave both as

waves and particles

because it only happens

when you’re not looking.

It’s kind of like the moment

when the dust that rings around planets

begins to coalesce into moons

or when blood cells pile on top of each other
forming scabs over wet wounds

or when a bobbing wave

breaks and curls into the sand of the shoreline.  

The math that makes 

trees branch and rivers snake

shapes the contours of your face

and sweeping eyelashes

that rise and break

crashing onto

the apples of your cheeks.

This is a spiral galaxy
and neural network
and Eisenhower’s interstate with
its Howard Johnson’s motor lodges
and MAGA hats sloped, third eyes muffled,
hearts tunneled out to make room for cash flow.

Newton could not decipher light,

but neither could the trilobites

that swam nakedly

through Earth’s ancient seas or
the saber-toothed cats that roamed across our

fertile, glacial-pressed, and
now train track-covered terrain.