Isaac Moon ‘27
30 October 2025
Bits of swirling brown dust move ever closer to me,
Swirling and endlessly turning, light years away.
You close in on me: Trifid turns up her nose
at the universe’s expansion, as if to refuse
that our pocket universe will not accelerate
into oblivion with dark energy pushing us apart.
The cyclical theory may happen and collapse the old
universe but give us the chance from the start—
for our world to inflate and soothe us in the fact
(through the Crunch)
that everything’s possible in infinity and repetition;
even our own universe can unfold in the space-time fabric
and though we succumb to gravitational attrition
and dark energy pulls us in a red shift
proportional to the speed of light, faster
and gaining traction faster until our spirals break
their clasped promise of permanent attraction.
Then dust returns to dust, light years away but still clasping
A promise of a blue shift, closer together into a bursting violet nebula—
a final pact of eternity and a new ultimate fate.