The Mathematician's Search (For Weightlessness)

[hillwalker]

THE MATHEMATICIAN’S SEARCH (FOR WEIGHTLESSNESS)

I visit you
and yet it’s always you that brings me flowers…..
the scent of lavender today
bloodshot blossoms on a tissue
your pale rose petal eyelids fluttering
their agonising algebra too subtle to decipher

There it is again
that nervous click inside your throat
that makes me hold my breath
and bite down on a wish
this lurch and tug inside my heart
reverse the hurricane inside the head
another axis to explore

I clutch your insubstantial fingers
seeking by their touch
a mute accord
we’ll press ‘eject’ together
jettison this sterile world
Mach 25.4
to heaven or oblivion

H

[Jerrybaldy]

I'm reading I'm reading Hill. Has a dreamlike quality and a romanticism and a thought of death but infathomable so far in the whole until someone comments a lot more sense than you are going to get from Jerry B. That said if I never understood it I would still enjoy reading it.

[Bar22do]

It must be a love poem, hill, and here is what supports my guess :smile5::

Mach number (Ma or M) (generally pronounced /ˈmɑːk/, sometimes /ˈmɑːx/ or /ˈmæk/) is the speed of an object moving through air, or any other fluid substance, divided by the speed of sound as it is in that substance for its particular physical conditions, including those of temperature and pressure. It is commonly used to represent the speed of an object when it is travelling close to or above the speed of sound.

where
is the Mach number
is the speed of the source (the object relative to the medium) and
is the speed of sound in the medium

perhaps also "your pale rose petal eyelids fluttering" to name only a few!

A very clever and so well achieved! Kudos, hill, really, your creative artistic mind never ceases to astonish.

Bar

[Hawkman]

I do like this hill, but wonder if, "Escape Velocity" would not have been a better title.

Best, H

[hillwalker]

@Jer- thanks, death or euthanasia is one interpretation but it's up to the reader to take from this what they will, nothing more

@Bar - again thank you for finding beauty in this - it is indeed a love poem that can be read in at least one of two ways

@Hawk - displaying your knowledge of aerodynamics I see.
I think 'Escape Velocity' might suggest the narrator was merely looking to escape - and I prefer my title as it hopefully conveys the awkwardness of someone practical trying to get in touch with their more romantic side.

H

[PrinceMyshkin]

It was somewhat hard for me to finger the precise line between hope and hopelessness in this but I contented myself with the usual intelligent, controlled articulation of it.

[hillwalker]

@Prince..... I was trying to write something slightly more elusive than some of my earlier pieces, where two almost diametrically opposed interpretations could be gleaned as it were from the one poem. Hope and hopelessness sum much of it up..... thank you.

[dafydd manton]

You certainly achieved elusiveness, Hill. Much like Jerry, I couldn't quite work out where to go with it, although the comments of others have cleared a bit of the mist. But again, and I hate to agree with him, Jerry's comment that you don't need to understand it to enjoy it is valid.

[PrinceMyshkin]

I'm reading I'm reading Hill. Has a dreamlike quality and a romanticism and a thought of death but infathomable so far in the whole until someone comments a lot more sense than you are going to get from Jerry B. That said if I never understood it I would still enjoy reading it.

Bravo! That last line sums up the attitude we ought to take to poems like this, in which a plain, uniliteral reading can't be made, but the strength and beauty of the language, the elegance of the line-breaks are pleasures enough - and whether we trust it or not something of the ambiguous meaning seeps into us.

[hillwalker]

Thank you daf (and Prince again). My work here is done.....

[dafydd manton]

Go and get a drink - you've earned it!

[hillwalker]

Hehe..... too late, been out, had a pint and back at the keyboard. But thanks for the kind thought.

[Delta40]

is this about your dear loved one in aged care? that is how it struck me and the second stanza is especially lovely

[hillwalker]

Delta - Brownie points indeed


is this about your dear loved one in aged care?

it can be (purely imaginary btw)

That was one interpretation I'd hoped for (and the narrator's frustration at his inability to reach out to her) - the other was a pair of lovers (not necessarily aged) about to embark on a physical relationship (the narrator again hindered by his not-so-romantic mindset).

[Delta40]

the smell of lavendar has always reminded me of sweet wrinkly grandmas!

[hillwalker]

Precisely - you are very astute.