The Hubble Deep Field Image

Printed, from high resolution, taped to the wall,

I sit a metre or so away, then approach,

Set my eye as close as my nose allows,

Trying to see each pixel, of our attempt to encroach,

On the limits of perspective, philosophical and physical.

The image isn’t balanced, (I think of Renaissance artwork),

Its loud, harsh light’s colours on an ill-captured void,

Nihilism’s argument against Meaning’s work.

A finger’s width or less is all that divides

Each luminous point from its neighbour’s embrace.

I place my finger on the page ‘tween two points,

A mind’s eye and fingernail crossing vast space.

Why bother, one wonders, as the nail marks a path,

between stars that are galaxies racing away

From everything else. Each light’s island is stark,

Facts we all can ignore in the bright blue of day.

Sitting again, at a distance of a metre,

The image diminished against pale cream walls,

Structure reasserts, brief insights flicker

And pass as I plan my evening, and who to call.

Later some drinks; I laugh, dance and kiss,

The photo crumpled in a wastepaper basket,

But when thoughts of the blackness between points of colour

Linger in quiet spaces, drunk, I return home and ask it,

“Why?” It doesn’t answer. Impotent, it mocks,

For it knows that in vastness all meaning is lost.

“That’s a gift”, I think, my mind slurring out loud,

“Freedom is a universe, a finger’s width across”