To the Chief Musician upon Nabla: A Tyndallic Ode

                              I.

I come from fields of fractured ice,
          Whose wounds are cured by squeezing,
Melting they cool, but in a trice,
          Get warm again by freezing.
Here, in the frosty air, the sprays
          With fern-like hoar-frost bristle,
There, liquid stars their watery rays
          Shoot through the solid crystal.

                              II.

I come from empyrean fires—
          From microscopic spaces,
Where molecules with fierce desires,
          Shiver in hot embraces.
The atoms clash, the spectra flash,
          Projected on the screen,
The double D, magnesian b,
          And Thallium’s living green.

                              III.

We place our eye where these dark rays
          Unite in this dark focus,
Right on the source of power we gaze,
          Without a screen to cloak us.
Then, where the eye was placed at first,
          We place a disc of platinum,
It glows, it puckers! will it burst?
          How ever shall we flatten him!

                              IV.

This crystal tube the electric ray
          Shows optically clean,
No dust or haze within, but stay!
          All has not yet been seen.
What gleams are these of heavenly blue?
          What air-drawn form appearing,
What mystic fish, that, ghostlike, through
          The empty space is steering?

                              V.

I light this sympathetic flame,
          My faintest wish that answers,
I sing, it sweetly sings the same,
          It dances with the dancers.
I shout, I whistle, clap my hands,
          And stamp upon the platform,
The flame responds to my commands,
          In this form and in that form.

                              VI.

What means that thrilling, drilling scream,
          Protect me! ’tis the siren:
Her heart is fire, her breath is steam,
          Her larynx is of iron.
Sun! dart thy beams! in tepid streams,
          Rise, viewless exhalations!
And lap me round, that no rude sound
          May mar my meditations.

                              VII.

Here let me pause.—These transient facts,
          These fugitive impressions,
Must be transformed by mental acts,
          To permanent possessions.
Then summon up your grasp of mind,
          Your fancy scientific,
Till sights and sounds with thought combine
          Become of truth prolific.

                              VIII.

Go to! prepare your mental bricks,
          Fetch them from every quarter,
Firm on the sand your basement fix
          With best sensation mortar.
The top shall rise to heaven on high—
          Or such an elevation,
That the swift whirl with which we fly
          Shall conquer gravitation.

—James Clerk Maxwell

 

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