Ken Haas<\/strong><\/p> Ken Haas<\/strong><\/p> \/\/\/ Einstein Ken Haas He could have just told us the scientific truth. That E equals m. c squared? He made that part up. It\u2019s a constant so if smaller units of measure are picked for E and larger ones for m c just disappears into the pure equivalence of energy and matter. He could have … <\/p>\n
\n\n\n\n
He could have just told us the scientific
\ntruth. That E<\/em> equals m<\/em>.
\n
\nc<\/em> squared? He made that part up.
\nIt\u2019s a constant
\nso if smaller units of measure are picked for E<\/em>
\nand larger ones for m<\/em>
\nc<\/em> just disappears
\ninto the pure equivalence of energy and matter.
\n
\nHe could have fixed on any fixture:
\nfurlongs from Venus to Mars,
\ncombined weight of oceans,
\ngirth of a pin.
\n
\nIn choosing as his fiction
\nto mediate between E<\/em> and m<\/em>
\na figure in the billions
\nmarking light and speed
\nhe was making an artistic decision,
\ntelling us the way, say, Beethoven did
\n
\nhow small things are relative
\nto the forces that drive them
\n
\n(the sun\u2019s mass a dog bone
\nto its own hellfire,
\nthe thousand-year oak a scrag
\nto the wind that wants to get crazy)
\n
\n how insatiable the love
\nbetween energy and matter
\nand how dark the human harness,
\n
\n how useful light would be,
\nlots of it, squared,
\n
\n how wise it would be
\nto come quickly.
\n\n\n\nThe Downlookers<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>
\n\n\n\n
Step on a crack, break your mother\u2019s back<\/em>,
\nis how I became one,
\non the daily march to junior high,
\npoliced by the Dyckman gang
\nto warily skirt every sidewalk line.
\nFriends from the burbs and even darker hoods
\njoined in their own ways,
\nback before owners had to scoop up after their hounds,
\nback when having the wrong guy
\nthink you were looking at him
\nwasn\u2019t just a bad movie.
\nWe\u2019re the brooders, the schemers,
\nthe director at a Hollywood pool party with the foot fetish,
\nthe golfer who has no idea where her drive went
\nbut always picks up the tee.
\nWe\u2019re not chatting in elevators or going to air shows,
\ndropping pencils to peek up the cheerleader\u2019s skirt,
\nor pointing at heaven after a goal.
\nGo ahead, color us hostile, skittish, shamed.
\nBut it\u2019s a life. One not without pride.
\nAnd there are more of us now,
\ndriving while texting, texting while crossing the street,
\npanning the beach for coins, checking the cup for alms.
\nWatch out for us.
\nThe puddle makes more sense than the rain.
\nWe know the price of connection,
\nthe vanity of seeing what\u2019s coming,
\nthe broken glass, the rusted key in melting snow,
\nthe blade of grass that has won its war with the street.
\n\n\n\n
Ken Haas lives in San Francisco where he works in healthcare and sponsors a poetry writing program at the UCSF Children’s Hospital. His poems have appeared in over 50 journals, including Clare<\/em>, Freshwater<\/em>, Helix<\/em>, Natural Bridge<\/em>, Nimrod<\/em>, Poet Lore<\/em>, Quiddity<\/em>, and Spoon River<\/em>. He was the winner of the 2020 Red Mountain Press Discovery Award for his poetry collection, Borrowed Light<\/a>. You can visit him online at kenhaas.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"