A Letter from Galileo

 The following is a poem that was inspired by the book, Galileo's Daughter which detailed the correspondence of this great astronomer, Galileo, with his devoted and loving daughter, Sister Marie Celeste, a nun living in a convent outside of Florence. Her order followed the practices of St. Francis of Assisi. Galileo's letters to his daughter have been lost to history, probably burned by the convent's Mother Superior, because of Galileo's conviction as a heretic for proposing that the Earth revolved around the Sun. The fear of investigation by the Holy Inquisition has robbed us of Galileo's letters. But in Sister Maria Celeste's correspondence with her father, we get a half of the view into the love and devotion this father and daughter held for one one another. Since Galileo shared many of his ideas and theories with his daughter, I wondered what Galileo would have said at his daughter's postulancy (when she took her vows, comparable to a marriage to Jesus). I must confess that my original version of this poem was written in honor of my niece's and her fiance's wedding. I hope they will forgive me that I modified it to bring it closer to a metaphysical point I wanted to make.

A Letter from Galileo

I have been truly blessed by God,

Who has let me view so deeply into this vast creation.

I see in the heavens God's instruction to us 

As we embark on Love's journey;

For what is human love but a harmonic of God's passion in us, 

Which creates a new and unexpected universe within,

Where there was only dark longing and chaotic despair.

Seeing God's work, I can discard the ancient, but cherished, belief,

Which anchors the Earth in the center of the vast firmament.

I know this view prevails upon our naive notions of love, 

And causes us to cast our lot in love with apprehension of change.

For we expect love to be fixed and unmoving, 

Like the Earth upon which we tread.

We tear from the Earth's heart the very elements

That best betray our fear of change,

As if these honor our love with something of timeless value.

We propose our undying love with the diamond,

Nature's hardest stone,

Whose shine is only derived 

By reflecting God's most perfect and uncontainable light.

We bind ourselves in marriage with bands of gold,

Hoping to chain our beating hearts together

With a metal that may stretch but never break.

We thus confuse constancy with value.

But nothing in this great universe is spared transformation.

I know now that the Earth races around the Sun in a near-eternal fall,

A swinging revolutionary dance,

That sweeps our world in fiery arms through every wintry sleep.

I implore you, my daughter,

To know and celebrate this ever-changing universe 

That you are now creating in your marriage to God's Son.

Hold onto Him in the same divine embrace that created all things.

Lose yourself in an impassioned gaze.

Inhale and feel your hearts join into a single beat.

Look deeply, as deeply as I have looked into these heavens.

See this universe at its beginning,

Poised before time, or space, or matter.

Embrace this universe in a singular and absolute attraction.

Exhale and send your light across the sky!