Entropy (Or infidelity)

Neil Philip Young

Mistress Dumpty watched her husband fall and fracture

And it followed that the great powers of the realm could not restore him to her
         and nothing could ever be the same.

Falls had befallen all the King’s Men too

Their fractures were the sequelae of
lies
or secrets
or betrayals

All in accordance with the Second Law of Thermodynamics which stipulates that, 
in the fullness of time, 
all things degrade and break into irreversible disorder  

Time does not run backwards.

Our shames are pinioned to the past.

We long to recover our beloved  
unbroken egg
unbroken ship
unbroken vow
unbroken heart

During its long voyage the ship of Theseus broke apart, piece by piece.
And each piece was replaced with a piece of wood from its cargo casks
until the ship was restored.

Its superposable structure remained the same,
But its singular essence did not.

(a covenant was broken)

And Theseus knew the ship was no longer his.

The Science

For several decades structure has had considerable traction in physics. The trend is now turning away from the nature of objects (particles, planets etc.), towards an understanding of the relationships between them. This poem addresses the notion of ‘structure’ in the context of an identity between two structures. Leibniz’ Law states, that no two things can share all their properties in common. There are inevitably indiscernibles that oppose the possibility of any claim for an identity. I am proposing a psychological reason to reject such a claim. For example, if your friend is found to have exploited you, is he or she, (in your mind), the same friend, or has something changed? Do you recognize him in the same, identical, way? This poem employs aesthetics as an additional means to question the concept of Identity.

The Poet

Neil Philip Young is an American poet living in the Bay Area of California. For Nearly two decades he has been experimenting with conjoining scientific discourse with poetics. He has published papers (and is in the process of contributing others.) His interests range over such topics as Vermeer, aesthetics, the growth of knowledge, and Shakespeare.

Next poem: Future Perfect by Manash Bagchi