THE END OF TIME

A billion tons of coal

burned for books, statistics,

and for Clio, unsmiling queen of papyrus.

In a century or two

we’ll cram the galaxy

with blind idols, invisible drumbeats.

Someday time may be more

than hypotheses, its sense recast,

the dust of lost theorems

brushed off, consigning half of history

to the prehistoric. Someone

will refashion nature as strange fauna

of magnetic beasts, phosphoric livestock;

a new Zodiac

with antennas, huge bells, winged starships

predicting the end of the end; or simply

contrive a formula to remember

and forget, freezing any drift,

the fourth dimension now in sight.

For me this shoreline is enough,

how that cloud bisects the moon,

its skirt trailing through waves.

Tonight the sky’s a cupola

strewn with figured silver,

the far-flung catapult of stars.