Coelorum Perrupit Claustra
We recently visited Bath and found a Museum dedicated to William Herschel, astronomer and discoverer of Uranus. The museum is in the very house where he discovered the planet. It was mind-blowing that one man in tiny garden behind a Georgian townhouse essentially doubled the size of the solar system. What was very interesting was the work that his sister, the first female astronomer paid by the state, did in her own right -as a comet chaser – and with her brother.
This poem took a long time because I got caught in a writing loop where I couldn’t see past the intimate notion of equating the scent of the garden with the discovery of the planet. Think about that for a second and understand why that wouldn’t work. Once I’d got past that and come up with the notion of Uranus discovering Herschel, things worked out a little better.
Coelorum Perrupit Claustra
The dervish sylphs notice that
His curiosity is piqued
by the smallest of specks
in the braille point sea.
He squints as he focuses,
fixing his aerial gaze
on a delicate tunnel
of rosewood and speculum.
An elegant man
in a small formal garden
of phlox and delphinium,
stares back at him, amazed.
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