Preacher Paradox

To the white candle

The white peony is death,

Moving still as death.

~Kyoroku [Englished by Phillip Whidden*]

~ Ecclesiastes 1:2

The peony and candle both seem still,

But “seeming” never/always still contains

Un(numb)ered movements.  Particles feel thrill.

Electron movement is a truth that strains

Against the petty truths we call our faiths.

One thing is certain—just one thing alone.

All other doctrines are like petaled wraiths

That swirl around.  They never can atone

For daydream wish.  The cosmos . . . as we know

It . . . it will die and as we know it, we

Will die.  That certainty has Black Hole glow.

That’s it.  There’s nothing like infinity.

  Infinity, if it exists, surrounds

    The doom called death.  Death alone abounds.

*  So far as I know, the oxymoron “moving still” is not entailed in Kyoroku’s haiku.

©  Phillip Whidden