{"id":1925,"date":"2010-10-19T08:00:17","date_gmt":"2010-10-18T19:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/?p=1925"},"modified":"2010-10-17T15:20:43","modified_gmt":"2010-10-17T02:20:43","slug":"tuesday-poem-nanosphere-by-harvey-molloy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/2010\/10\/19\/tuesday-poem-nanosphere-by-harvey-molloy\/","title":{"rendered":"Tuesday Poem: “Nanosphere” by Harvey Molloy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nanosphere<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The Enemy of the World
\nwatery eyed, unkempt,
\nfinally captured after months in a hole.<\/p>\n

A lab coat prods his back dentures
\nwith a disposable spatula.\u00a0 How
\nslow and compliant the prisoner moves
\nlike a rest home inmate.<\/p>\n

In this cosmos his capture
\nshall be eclipsed by news
\nof the accidental discovery of the end of time<\/p>\n

as weightless above this earth
\nfrom the station console
\nIrina checks the Doppler shifts
\nfrom the Sombrero, Andromeda, closer Tau Ceti.<\/p>\n

Aware of the pressure of the moment
\nshe pauses to gaze at the withered fingers
\nof a passing river delta
\nthen tells Control her final confirmation:<\/p>\n

the expansion is over and the big crunch has begun
\nthe slow seven billion year retrenchment
\nfrom universe to nanosphere.<\/p>\n

Her news crosses the twittering
\nof the only known radio intelligence:<\/p>\n

0800 chatline numbers
\npsychic advice lines
\nimpending Serbian elections
\nweather updates
\nbody counts
\nChinese operas
\nMarilyn\u2019s slow turn in a hall of mirrors
\nChico and the Man.<\/p>\n

The day\u2019s journeying calls roll out
\nwithin the bounded horizon of vast contracting dot.
\nThere is only so much time and time is running back.<\/p>\n

The children watch television in the dark.<\/p>\n

(c) Harvey Molloy<\/p>\n

Published in Voyagers: Science Fiction Poetry from New Zealand, <\/strong><\/em>Ed. Tim Jones & Mark Pirie, Interactive Press, Australia, 2009<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

About Harvey Molloy:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Harvey\u2019s poetry and short fiction have appeared in Albatross<\/em>, Blackmail Press<\/em>, Brief<\/em>, Bravado, Jaam, Lancashire Life, The Lumi\u00e8re Reader, NZ Listener, Poetry New Zealand, Southern Ocean Review <\/em>and Takahe<\/em>. He is a previous winner of the New Zealand International Poetry Competition for his poem “Diwali<\/em> “and his first book of poems, Moonshot<\/em>, was published by Steele Roberts in 2008. He has also published non-fiction work on Asperger Syndrome, and is the co-author, with Latika Vasil, of the book Asperger Syndrome, Adolescence, and Identity: Looking Beyond the Label. <\/em>He is now working on his second book of poems. Harvey is a secondary school teacher in Wellington, New Zealand. You may also visit Harvey on his website, here<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

About Nanosphere<\/em>:<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have previously featured another Voyagers<\/strong><\/em> anthology poem as my Tuesday Poem selection (Tim Jones’ The First Artist on Mars<\/em><\/a>)—but Voyagers<\/em> <\/a>contains many outstanding poems. In particular, I very much like the way Harvey Molloy’s Nanopshere <\/em>makes the speculative shift from a real world event to the cosmic stage in a way that juxtaposes an array of “relativities”. It seemed both fitting—given that I am currently hosting a series of guest posts by Australian and NZ Fantasy-Science Fiction authors—and timely to feature another science fiction poem from an anthology of New Zealand poems brought out by an Australian publisher.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

To read the featured poem on the Tuesday Poem Blog<\/strong>\u2014and link to other Tuesday Poets posting around NZ and the world\u2014either click here <\/a>or on the Quill icon in the sidebar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nanosphere The Enemy of the World watery eyed, unkempt, finally captured after months in a hole. A lab coat prods his back dentures with a disposable spatula.\u00a0 How slow and compliant the prisoner moves like a rest home inmate. In this cosmos his capture shall be eclipsed by news of the accidental discovery of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1925","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-other-writers","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1925"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1962,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925\/revisions\/1962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/helenlowe.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}