Tag: Light

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Light’s Posthumous Letter by Norazha Paiman

We only see stars
that died millennia past—
the sky is a tomb.

by Norazha Paiman

Due to the finite speed of light (299,792,458 meters per second) and the vast distances in space, we observe celestial objects not as they are now, but as they were when their light began its journey to Earth.

A light-year is the distance light travels in one year (approximately 9.46 trillion kilometers). This temporal delay means that astronomy is fundamentally the study of the past; every observation is historical documentation, and the present state of the universe remains forever invisible to us. The night sky is effectively an archive of extinct or transformed objects whose light continues to travel long after the original source has changed or ceased to exist.

Further reading:

‘What is a light year?’, 2021, Gordon, J. & Childers, T., Space.com, available: https://www.space.com/light-year.html

‘Death by Black Hole: And Other Cosmic Quandaries’, 2007, Tyson, N. D., W. W. Norton & Company, ISBN 978-0393062243.

Author bio:

Norazha Paiman teaches English and Greek and Latin in Scientific Terminology at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, where his research bridges psychometrics and poetics. He writes poetry that reimagines how science feels, with work appearing in Poetizer, Substack, Consilience, and Poets for Science.

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A super position by John Hawkhead

quantum superpositioning myself in her g-B-o-A-o-D-d books

by John Hawkhead

Quantum superposition is the principle that a quantum system can exist in many states simultaneously until it is measured or observed directly. Measurement forces the system to ‘collapse’ to a single, definite state. The concept is demonstrated by the ‘double’-slit experiment which shows that light and matter can act as waves and particles at the same time.

Perhaps the most famous thought experiment associated with this phenomenon is Schrödinger’s Cat which illustrates superposition. In quantum superposition theory a cat, locked in a box with poison in a flask and a radioactive source that may or may not release the poison, is both alive and dead at the same time until the box is opened and reveals the definite state of the cat. The poem is a light hearted response to the theory.

Further reading:

‘Quantum superposition’, Wikipedia article, available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_superposition

Author bio:

John Hawkhead (@haikuhawk.bsky.social) is a writer and artist from the south-west of England. His work has been published globally over the last 25 years, including three books of haiku / senryu: ‘Small Shadows’ and ‘Bone Moon’ (available from Alba Publishing. http://www.albapublishing.com/) and ‘Four Horse Parable’ (available from Nun Prophet Press).

Read more of John’s sciku here!

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Message Lost by Scott Edgar

Through interstellar
Space to us then getting lost
In yellow street lamps

by Scott Edgar

This haiku captures the bittersweet journey of starlight. After traveling tens or hundreds or even billions of light years through interstellar space, it ends up lost in the ambient glow of artificial light.

On a practical level, it reflects the impact of light pollution: how the soft yellow of street lamps drowns out the ancient light of stars, severing a connection that once bound us to the night sky. What was once a shared human experience of looking up and seeing the cosmos is now dimmed, both literally and spiritually.

Further reading:

‘Light pollution has cut humanity’s ancient connection with the stars – but we can restore it’, 2023, Graur, O., The Conversation, available: https://doi.org/10.64628/AB.afg9r7ph9

‘Stars disappear before our eyes in light pollution, citizen scientists report’, 2023, U.S. National Science Foundation, available: https://www.nsf.gov/news/stars-disappear-our-eyes-light-pollution-citizen

Author bio:

Scott is a father of five who finds peace in long desert hikes, wildflowers in mountain meadows, and the occasional perfectly shaped rock. He’s a self-published poet with three books out, including a collection of haiku, and a fourth on the way, the host of The Poet (delayed) podcast (available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts here: https://blessed-pine-5317.fireside.fm ), and the co-founder of “Torchlight,” a monthly arts and open mic event in Bountiful, Utah. He also practices law in solo practice, balancing the legal world with a steady pull toward creative life. You can follow Scott on Instagram @poetdelayed.

Read more of Scott’s sciku here.

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magic cloak by Susan Polizzotto

stillness of the stars
traveling through space and time
in a light jacket

by Susan Polizzotto

This poem uses the season word “light jacket” to allude to nuclear fusion in a playful way. Light emitted by a star is like a magic cloak that enables it to travel through space and time. Just as a person’s jacket reveals something of their personality, a star’s jacket provides information about its location, movement, and other characteristics and properties.

Further reading:

‘There’s More to Light Than Meets the Eye’, 1996, Fischer, D. & Musser, G., The Universe in the Classroom, Astronomical Society of the Pacific, available: https://astrosociety.org/file_download/inline/82284257-466b-4b8f-9a75-15999e0902a8#:~:text=Theinformationridingonwavesoflight,theyareandwhethertheyhaveplanets.

Author bio:

Susan Polizzotto is a writer, artist, and retired Coast Guard officer who teaches and practices shodõ (Japanese calligraphy). Her book of translations of 125+ haiku by Chiyo-ni, an Edo-period woman haiku master, is forthcoming from World Poetry. You can find out more about Susan and her shodõ teaching here: https://artexposure50.com/?page_id=2139

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Gravity of Thought by Neena Singh

quantum physics
trying to wrap my head
around dark matter

by Neena Singh

What is Dark Matter?

Unsolved problem in physics: Dark matter is a form of matter that doesn’t emit, absorb, or reflect light, making it invisible. Its presence is inferred through its gravitational effects on visible matter, such as galaxies and stars.

Proportion: It accounts for approximately 27% of the universe’s mass-energy content, compared to just 5% for normal (baryonic) matter.

Further reading:

‘Dark matter’, Wikipedia article, available: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter

Author bio:

Neena Singh is a banker turned poet. Her haikai poetry is regularly published in journals and magazines. She has published three books of poetry—”Whispers of the Soul: the journey within”, “One Breath Poetry” and the upcoming “A Peacock’s Cry – seasons of haiku”. She runs a non-profit for quality interventions in the education and health of underprivileged children in Chandigarh, India.

This poem was originally published in Haiku Dialogue, 29th January 2025.

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The deepest shade by Mike Fainzilber

the deepest shade of cold
an ambush
for the light

by Mike Fainzilber

The James Webb Space Telescope takes images of the furthest (hence oldest) and faintest objects in the universe using infrared light. In order to do this without being blinded by infrared radiation from heat emitters (including its’ own components) it has detectors that must be hyper-cooled to temperatures of less than 7 degrees Kelvins (which is approximately -266 C or -447 F).

Further reading:

‘James Webb Space Telescope’, nasa.gov, available: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb

Author bio:

Mike Fainzilber’s day job is a biologist. He began writing haiku and senryu during the pandemic, and this side effect of COVID-19 has not worn off yet. Editors in his two spheres of activity have been known to suggest that he should best restrict his efforts to the other sphere. Find out more about Mike’s research via his lab’s website and connect with him on Bluesky https://bsky.app/profile/mfainzilber.bsky.social .

Read more sciku by Mike here.

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Light by Jonathan Aylett

coming through in waves
or particles, I can’t tell
October sunlight

by Jonathan Aylett

A classically structured haiku using the kigo “October sunlight”, which refers to the well known double slit experiment of quantum physics.

Further reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment

Author bio:

Jonathan has been writing and publishing poetry for several years. His work has featured in journals dedicated to haiku, and broader literary journals, and won competitions across both disciplines. His collection ‘Goldfish’ – a mix of haiku and long form poetry, will be published by Stairwell books in spring 2024. You can follow Jonathan on Instagram here: @jonathanaylettpoetry 

Read other sciku by Jonathan here: ‘String Theory’, ‘Moss’, ‘Dusty Shoulders’, and ‘Attraction’.

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Dancing by John Hawkhead

photons
E=mc2
dancing

By John Hawkhead

Photons are some of the most fascinating particles in the physical sciences; fundamental particles of light that are the smallest possible packets of electromagnetic energy.

Albert Einstein’s mass–energy equivalence (represented by the formula E = mc2) gives the basic relation between mass and energy, stating that under appropriate situations mass and energy are interchangeable and the same. Yet photons have a rest mass of zero – they are massless particles – therefore should they even have any energy at all? And if they have neither mass nor energy then would they even physically exist?

E = mc2 is actually a special case of the more general equation E2 = p2c2 + m2c4, where E is energy, p is momentum, c is the speed of light and m is mass at rest. Since photons have no mass, this equation becomes E = pc.  Effectively, photons get their energy from their momentum and can never be at rest, constantly moving.

How they move has been the subject of study for decades, with recent research suggesting that photons can behave as both particles and waves (to find out more, check out the sciku ‘Spooky Interaction’, also by John Hawkhead).

This sciku plays around with the concepts of photons, square dancing and the randomness of measuring the path of photons.

Further reading:

‘Light has no mass so it also has no energy according to Einstein, but how can sunlight warm the earth without energy?’, Science Questions with Surprising Answers: https://www.wtamu.edu/~cbaird/sq/2014/04/01/light-has-no-mass-so-it-also-has-no-energy-according-to-einstein-but-how-can-sunlight-warm-the-earth-without-energy/

‘Mass–energy equivalence’, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass%E2%80%93energy_equivalence

‘Does light have mass?’, Physics FAQ: https://www.desy.de/user/projects/Physics/Relativity/SR/light_mass.html

Author bio:

John Hawkhead (@HawkheadJohn) has been writing haiku and illustrating for over 25 years. His work has been published all over the world and he has won a number of haiku competitions. John’s books of haiku and senryu, ‘Small Shadows’ and ‘Bone Moon’, are now available from Alba Publishing (http://www.albapublishing.com/). Read more of John’s sciku here!

‘Dancing’ was previously published in Failed Haiku 74 (1 Feb 2022).

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A Sciku for Rayner Explainer by Dr Michael J. Leach

the best science show
at the Fringe—sound & light waves
illuminate minds

by Dr Michael J. Leach

This sciku is a tribute to science communicator Rayner Explainer’s show A Flying Photon.

This show about the all-important photon—an elementary particle of light—has received excellent reviews, including but not limited to ones in InDaily, On The Record UniSA, and The AU Review.

Following sold-out shows at the Adelaide Fringe 2022, A Flying Photon won the Science at the Fringe Award presented by Inspiring SA. You can read more about the show’s topic in Rachel Rayner’s poem ‘Photonics’, which appeared in the debut issue of Consilience.

Check out more sciku by Michael, including ‘The Burden of Bushfire Smoke‘, ‘The Core Correlate of COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance‘, ‘Drug-Induced Hip Fractures‘, ‘The Psychopharmacological Revolution‘, ‘Quality of Life at Seven Years Post-Stroke‘, ‘The Early Impacts of COVID-19 on Australian General Practice‘, and ‘Australian Science Poetry‘ with science communicator Rachel Rayner. Michael also has another Covid-19-related sciku published in Pulse which is well worth checking out: ‘flu shot announcement‘.

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The Dimming Forebear

Gaia. Rooting out
planetary impostures.
K’s false positives.

The Kepler Space Telescope was designed to discover earth-sized planets orbiting around other stars within our region of the Milky Way. Named after German astronomer and mathematician, Johannes Kepler, it was launched in 2009 and retired on the 15th November 2018, the 388th anniversary of the death of its namesake in 1630.

During its lifetime the Kepler Space Telescope discovered 2,662 planets, something it achieved by observing 530,506 stars and looking for drops in their intensity that could indicate a planet passing in front of them. Among these planets were some that were the correct distance from their star and had the right size and atmospheric pressure to support liquid water at the planet’s surface. Other planets discovered orbited two stars instead of one, and ‘hot Jupiters’ – gas giants similar to Jupiter but orbiting in close proximity to their star.

Yet telescopes continue to advance technologically. The Kepler Space Telescope used a photometer to observe the stars in its field of view. The Gaia Space Observatory, launched in 2013, uses a photometer along with an astrometry instrument and a radial-vector spectrometer.

Now research by Niraula et al. (2022) suggests that three or even four of the planets identified by the Kepler Space Telescope aren’t planets at all but are in fact stars. The team was reviewing the planetary data produced by the Kepler Space Telescope and realised that with updated measurements from the Gaia Space Observatory the ‘planets’ Kepler-854b, Kepler-840b, and Kepler-699b were far too large to be planets – each of them two to four times the size of Jupiter. The fourth ‘planet’, Kepler-747b, is 1.8 times the size of Jupiter, at the very top end of observed planets, but its far distance from its star suggests that its more likely to be a star itself than a planet.

Four out of over two and a half thousand discovered planets isn’t a large amount and certainly doesn’t take anything away from the incredible job that the Kepler Space Telescope did during its lifetime. Yet the new findings are hugely important for our knowledge and understanding of planets – by correcting this error the planet dataset is more accurate for those who are studying the population of planets as a whole.

Original research: http://dx.doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/ac4f64

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Dark Matter by John Hawkhead

dark matter theory
how strange particles appear
as they disappear

By John Hawkhead

Dark matter is a term used to describe the effect on the movement of stars by what scientists hypothesise to be matter. However, dark matter does not emit light or energy, and so is ‘invisible’. To hold the elements of the universe together, dark matter must make up approximately 80-85% percent of the universe.

Many scientists think dark matter is made up of particles known as weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPS) or another type of particle the neutrino. The quantum world allows for the existence of virtual particles that can appear and disappear in zero point energy conditions.

Further reading: An Introduction to Dark Matter

John Hawkhead (@HawkheadJohn) has been writing haiku and illustrating for over 25 years. His work has been published all over the world and he has won a number of haiku competitions. John’s books of haiku and senryu, ‘Small Shadows’ and ‘Bone Moon’, are now available from Alba Publishing (http://www.albapublishing.com/).

Read more of John’s sciku here!

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Five and almost of a kind by Andrew Senior

I
Never let it be

Never let it be
forgot seeing is feeling
in another form

Sight the light of the blind
Sensation spent in a brain

II
I am most at home

I am most at home
in my imagination
as when science meets

crafted art, sees gravity’s
engines burning in the stars

III
Atoms are the shoes

Atoms are the shoes
of shape. We put them on to
walk this world. Smitten

with them we gallop over
its edge and into the dark

IV
How clever we are

How clever we are
to see what’s coming writing
on bark and spelling

with sticks taken from what had
already deciphered light

V
How dark a pupil

How dark a pupil
looks amplifying light’s streams
exchanging shadings

for meanings when trees convert
them only to be their lives

These five poems, “Shorts” as W.H. Auden used to call them, are part of a long series of meditations in poetry and essay about humility and ignorance, language and its limits and hence also the limits of knowledge. All in the context of science, particularly physics which is my over-riding interest.

Andrew Senior’s lifelong interest in science began as an often bed-ridden sickly child around the age of eight or nine with Astronomy. His professional career was in IT in the world of Unix/Linux servers. But Andrew never gave up an interest in science which by then had expanded from physics into biology courtesy of the best layman source there then was: The Scientific American. Long retired Andrew has continued these interests much assisted by the Internet, puzzling over the ruthless determination of humans to acquire power, gambling with their own extinction in the classic casino manner.