Unseen. Unheard.
Through the cold black cosmic clutter,
a jagged rock near the size of a house
streaks among familiar stars,
between planets yet unrecorded
in earth journals.
The speed is astonishing,
the course straight,
the destination: the
end of infinity.
Until the meteor
passes into the blue
haze surrounding Planet
Earth, an atmosphere
that resists penetration and
probing, a blue curtain
protecting the green planet
from cold extinction.
There is no anonymity when racing
through the blue corridors of heaven.
Atmosphere resists the intrusion,
applies pressures against the
meteor’s bad manners.
Result: chips and flakes and
bits and pieces fall away,
ripped from the diminishing
stone by furious friction. As
meteor’s size shrinks, the
heated stone begins to glow.
Light increases!
Brighter and brighter until the
pilgrim stone bursts into earth’s
awareness as pure light. “Look!”
he said, standing on the corner
of 5th and Main. “Is it the end
of time?” “No,” his friend replied,
“the end is always the beginning.”
Dense darkness.
Faint glow.
Pure brilliance!
If it were not for the friction,
would we ever know light?
Shining Spirit 
We had a lovely dinner with your son and daughter-in-law yesterday, because Carol’s two siblings are staying with us and they joined us as well, Steve and Julie. Julie. They picked a wonderful restaurant and the food was great, the conversation even better, and Carly explaining how her camera works on her phone to make people look. Fat was even more fun. More fun. She was taking pictures of everyone and adding 100 lb to their face. I thought of you several times during the evening, how much you would enjoy it, and how many ideas it would give you for your column. I like the meteor column metaphors a lot! Keep on writing. Virgil
The light is the way. gz