Bill Jenkinson
Oxford Stanza Two
“We are therefore led by experiment to the view that N is the same as the number of the place occupied by the element in the periodic system” – Henry Gwyn Jeffreys Moseley
From Somewhere
From somewhere
a self-reviewing boy
balancing one-legged
despoils the pipit’s nest
From somewhere
an untidy student
taking to wing in Trinity
finds experimental heights
From somewhere
a young physicist
crossing midnight’s hinterland
feels towards the atom’s heart
From somewhere
a virtuoso mind
solo on a vacuum tube
extracts an elemental ladder
From somewhere
a universe assembles
reaching into every corner
firing particles of light
© Bill Jenkinson, October 2015