{"id":3532,"date":"2025-04-24T09:56:53","date_gmt":"2025-04-24T14:56:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/?p=3532"},"modified":"2025-04-24T09:56:53","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T14:56:53","slug":"regarding-fermis-paradox","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/regarding-fermis-paradox\/","title":{"rendered":"Regarding Fermi’s Paradox"},"content":{"rendered":"

Laker Thrasher
\nUW Hospital
\n2024
\nPoem<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

 
\nOn what I can only assume was a beautiful day<\/p>\n

Enrico Fermi proposed a problem<\/p>\n

that everyone understood<\/p>\n

a cosmic ouroboros<\/p>\n

head to tail, beginning to end<\/p>\n

the eternal return<\/p>\n

to the infernal question:<\/p>\n

Are we alone in the universe?<\/em><\/p>\n

And we’ll spend the rest of our lives answering it<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I. The Great Filter.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hope is a dog<\/p>\n

that only knows how to run<\/p>\n

we gave it no choice<\/p>\n

take out the teeth,<\/p>\n

and what does that leave you?<\/p>\n

Something that must go<\/p>\n

as far as it can.<\/p>\n

Panting, we race<\/p>\n

around the great track of The Milky Way<\/p>\n

the odds 9-to-1,<\/p>\n

and no one on our side.<\/p>\n

But where does a dog go<\/p>\n

after the finish line?<\/p>\n

And how does it know<\/p>\n

when to stop?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

II. It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy others.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We have not met our end,<\/p>\n

but it is coming to meet us<\/p>\n

the bug under the glass,<\/p>\n

the severed legs in the stars,<\/p>\n

the once-bright beat of our wings<\/p>\n

too stained by fingers to fly again.<\/p>\n

Someone deems us unimportant,<\/p>\n

and there comes the shoe<\/p>\n

we are familiar with war<\/p>\n

but we are unfamiliar<\/p>\n

with being small<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

III. It is the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Through blue light, I watch<\/p>\n

a mother dam<\/p>\n

the hole<\/p>\n

in her baby\u2019s head.<\/p>\n

Across seas,<\/p>\n

the swell of her swan song<\/p>\n

reaches through my screen<\/p>\n

and shoves a fistful of feathers down my throat.<\/p>\n

Do I really need to explain this to you?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

IV. We are alone.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not the center of the universe,<\/p>\n

but the flaw within it<\/p>\n

a single speck<\/p>\n

in a single galaxy<\/p>\n

that found the will to survive when we shouldn\u2019t have<\/p>\n

I know what I said about hope before,<\/p>\n

but the blood in our bark is a kindness<\/p>\n

at least we can\u2019t hurt anyone else<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

V. We are not alone.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are eyes on all sides<\/p>\n

but they are afraid of what they see<\/p>\n

after all, what do we call<\/p>\n

what we don\u2019t know?<\/p>\n

Foreign<\/p>\n

Strange<\/p>\n

Alien<\/em><\/p>\n

we say these words<\/p>\n

before we say\u00a0friends<\/em><\/p>\n

can we blame them<\/p>\n

for driving by?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Anyway, the hypotheses have never been the point<\/p>\n

I care less about the stars<\/p>\n

and more about the people who look up to them<\/p>\n

and what every scientist has to say<\/p>\n

only says more about us<\/p>\n

So we answer Fermi’s question:<\/p>\n

Where is everybody?<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We are here.<\/p>\n

Because we have to be<\/p>\n

we are alone,<\/p>\n

and not alone<\/p>\n

living,<\/p>\n

in spite of it all<\/p>\n

and loving,<\/p>\n

because of it all<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Paradoxical.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Making dinner,<\/p>\n

keeping house<\/p>\n

waiting for a knock that might never come<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But if it does<\/p>\n

may we remember what it was like<\/p>\n

to feel at home.<\/p>\n

May we throw open the door, and say<\/p>\n

Hello from planet earth<\/em><\/p>\n

We\u2019re sorry about the mess<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Laker Thrasher UW Hospital 2024 Poem   On what I can only assume was a beautiful day Enrico Fermi proposed a problem that everyone understood a cosmic ouroboros head to tail, beginning to end the eternal return to the infernal question: Are we alone in the universe? And we’ll spend the rest of our lives… <\/p>\n

Read <\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[94,10],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-3532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spring-2025-issue","category-writing","tag-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3532"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3588,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3532\/revisions\/3588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ebling.library.wisc.edu\/corpus-callosum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}