Nothing says motherhood quite like the Large Hadron Collider. True to The Gift which we’re discussing at HighCallingBlogs.com, I wrote a gift poem for my wife about this scientific marvel.
I know. “Honey, I love you like the Large Hadron Collider…” It’s too romantic, isn’t it?
As Lewis Hyde points out in The Gift, writing or producing anything as a gift anchors the work in a specific time and place. The audience for gift art is so focused that often we appeal to a larger audience as well. Ironically, the more specific and concrete something is, the more often it will appeal to a general audience.
Enough intro. I can’t actually print this poem here because it was published by Strange Horizons–pretty much the best online science fiction magazine.
If you’re in the mood for a poem about colliding energy, carnival rides, the challenge of keeping families together, and of course motherhood, then go read the poem Revolution Day.
(They have a forum, too, but I couldn’t figure out how to use it.)
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High tech science under the Alps as carnival ride. I like it.
But did your wife?
Sometimes I think she doesn’t quite know what to do with my poetry. But I think she liked this one. It’s not a Hallmark card, that’s for sure.
I like it, and I’m not at all a science type. But I am a mother of a one. The wife of one. And the sister of a seriously passionate physics professor who lives and breathes superconductivity and magnetic fields. When he’s not loving his wife and son of course
I consider it a gift..
Nice, Marcus. You made mothering sound meaningful. Kudos to your wife!
Hyde (or you) is onto something, regarding gift specificity potentially appealing to a larger audience.
Bill Wasik’s book “And Then There’s This” discusses how things that go viral tend to have a relational imperative. People want to share whatever it is because they feel it speaks to their own relationships even as it addresses (overtly or not) someone else’s specific relationship.
Very glad this got published. It’s quite good, Marcus.
(I like your Mowing Dead Grass after Church on Sunday, too.)
that is over the top supper cool !
that means…i really do like it quite a lot.
Thanks, Nancy!
L.L, I’ve read ideas like what Wasik is describing. Things go viral because we feel they define us somehow to the people we send them to.
For example, I forward a video of Beaker singing Ode to Joy (or link to it) because I want people to know:
1) I’m the kind of guy who likes classical music and high art.
2) I’m also the kind of guy who thinks it is funny when Beaker explodes.
3) Maybe, I’m the kind of guy who understands that the world is filled with joy if I can just learn to see it.
Scientheology. Gotta love it.
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