Mall Walkers

 Walking around with no place to go
Some go fast and some go slow
Young and old alike go round
Seeing their friends, the old that are found.
Stories they tell, their likes they relate
Enjoying their talk, and rarely debate.
Their joy and friendship overflowing abound
Within all the walkers as they walk around.

Reductionism

As light reflected from her face's atoms
And entered through the lenses of my eyes,
The image was inverted and the light
From the reflection struck the retinal,
Transforming it from trans to cis, which made
A change in certain proteins in my cone
And rod-shaped cells that sent a pulse, electric,
Down to the optic nerve, which sent electrons
Through to the brain to process with its neural
Net through chemical, electric interactions
That, due to previous synaptic forms
Caused more electric signals to be sent
By neurons down the spinal chord to neurons
That sent a signal to the diaphragm,
Resulting in its quick contraction, breath
From lungs that filled with air, released in such
A way that low vibrations then were made
And passed across my tongue and lips that curved
By other neural pathways from the brain.
The oxytocin surged across my neurons.
This happens every time I see my love.

A Drop

A drop of crystal water hangs daintily
From the tip of the jagged, dark green leaf,
Slowly collecting molecule amounts
Of water until finally it pulsates
On the sharp tip before it can release
Itself to fall, an undulating sphere
Splitting the scattered light and scattering
Its colors across the darkling forest
Until it surfaces a leaf-lined pool
And scatters tiny droplet in the air
That come down crashing on the circle ripples
Spreading across the surface like your love.

Significance

 One cannot look into the deep, vast night
And fail to wonder. Who could ever know
Or comprehend or understand its size.
What is it that we see? What do we not?
How far to the edge of the universe?
How far to our nearest neighboring star?
A little over four light-years, so short
A distance--a little less than thirty-two
Trillion miles--distances measured six trillion
Miles at a time. One hundred billion stars
In but one galaxy--hundreds of billions
More galaxies just like it, each surrounded
By smaller galaxies that orbit, each
Containing billions more stars--systems strewn
In patterns of far greater structures. Here
We are, one species on a tiny planet
Orbiting a medium, yellow star.
Who are you in your self-placed, certain greatness?
Who are you in a cosmos where the center
Is everywhere and therefore everyone
Is the true center of the universe?