While sitting in my physics lecture (Physics for Liberal Arts Majors, that is), I was inspired by quantum theory and Schrödinger's Cat. And not inspired by some genius and scientific thought. Oh no. Instead I created a poetic analogy using the Schrödinger's Cat thought experiment as the vehicle in a metaphor about the state of my heart.
Schrödinger's cat: a thought experiment where a cat is placed in a steel box with a Geiger counter (no idea what that is), a small amount of radioactive material and hydrocyanic acid. If the radioactive material decays, then the hydrocyanic acid is released and the cat dies. If the radioactive material does not decay then the cat lives. But the cat is in a steel box so there is no way of knowing which event actually. Therefore, until the box is opened, the cat is both dead and alive at the same time.
This was about the most intriguing concept I learned in my physics class this quarter. So I decided to play with it:
Quantum Love
This heart was incidentally
accidentally dropped -
joined Schrödinger's cat
in perfect encasement.
Left with poisonous treachery
and a fifty fifty,
will this fly
or lose its steady beat?
My heart is locked in superposition:
quantum love alive and
quantum love dead.
Break open the prison. Would you
risk an extinguished core?
Locked in superposition
this heart is lifeless
and still ever living.
If I opened my chest to you,
the chance is yours.
After I finish and turn in my paper on quantum entanglement and Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials (oh yes, I can figure out how to write about books even in a physics class), I will no longer have to think in physics metaphors. A part of me laments this loss of new and confusing inspiration. The other 7/8 of me is ready for this class to be over.
The Big Bang was a grapefruit.
Don't ask.
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