The whale eye of the sun in the thin gray overcast,
walleye of a gray wall of animal
washed ashore

No vertebrate diet of comparable silica
content has been described. Though well defended

Hundreds came to pay tribute and to pick over more
than 22,000 objects: sequined vests, fur coats, goblets,

Radiographs showing fine details of vomer, dentition,
vertebral column, pectoral and pelvic girdles

gave way to works stripped of
anecdote, all light, hush

I feel so very grand
at this solemn
              and futile hour

The strength of its emission is consistent
with a pattern of violent collisions

was first performed in 1703, shortly after
the deaths that stirred Chikamatsu Monzaemon
to write his drama. Sometimes criticized

To focus all four on the same subject,
to combine their light in phase

Most of the mass of the universe
may be contained in dark matter.
No one knows what that may be.