Canto a la Vida, c.1970
For Alba and Santiago
They say that the Universe is silent.
Of course, there is no atmosphere and therefore no sound can be transmitted.
So far, I understand.
Yet it seems that the greatest minds, the best scientists in the world, have collected astronomical data from the most powerful telescopes and space stations and translated it into sounds audible to the human ear.
I imagine that this conversion of frequencies, oscillations, gravitational waves and who knows what else, to find these sounds of the cosmos, had to be very complicated.
Investigating a bit, in order to write this chronicle, I found a video where it is possible to hear these, rather grunts, made by galaxies, comets and black holes.
Truly remarkable.
But recently, in my simple and domestic life, without the help of NASA, without the Hubble telescope, without brainy calculations, without Schrodinger’s kittens, string theory, or Fibonacci series, I witnessed the most ancient sound in the universe.
It happened recently, one day when I went to accompany my daughter-in-law, Alba.
I closed my eyes to hear better.
Suddenly, I heard it clearly.
The echo of a long journey full of stars.
A heartbeat, constant and persistent.
Tic,tic,tic,tic…
The sweetest cosmic melody.
The true song to life.
The tenderness of the universe, there, in the womb of a mother.
A new heart has begun to beat.
Leonor Henríquez (Caracas, Venezuela) Civil Engineer by training (UCAB 1985), writer and apprentice poet by vocation. From her time in engineering emerged her Office Stories (1997), another way of seeing the corporate world. Her latest publications include reflections on grief, Hopecrumbs (2020) (www.hopecrumbs.com) and “The Adventures of Chispita” (2021) (www.chispita.ca) an allegory of life inside Mom’s belly.
Today she shares her “impulsive meditations” from Calgary, Canada, where she lives.
leonorcanada@gmail.com
by the same author