Some nights I think that the stars
Have died
Already died and these bright photons
Left over
Just waves of luminous spaghetti seen
End on
Millions of years from now will abruptly
Just stop
But I will never know being already
Dead too
Before all the old light is used up
And you
Whoever you are that remain planted
On earth
Will watch the last red-Dopplered quanta
So weary
With distance weighted with despair
Too tired
Even any longer to be but their message
Is clear
At last and you are the ones the
Only ones
Who will ever truly understand this
And believe
That all any person, plant, microbe, fire,
Or rock
Has ever done was to busy itself
With dying
And by now the ambient temperature
Of space
Having held steady at 3 degrees Kelvin
Almost forever
Begins to fall toward the black hole
Of zero
And what will you think as you feel
Yourself go
Wherever all of everything and the light and dark
Have gone
"Absolute Zero," by David Lunde, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
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