The Time It Takes

My ceiling is a white universe,

The spherical lamp-shade

A world suspended in the firmament:

Contours highlighted, a sprinkling of dust;

The air-conditioning unit

Is a vast starship probing its past.

All are white with clinical perfection.

No stars are visible, no sun;

Only in silence they orbit

The bed I am on.

 

I wonder suddenly at the space I comprise.

Yet I am sure the inhabitants

Are too preoccupied to notice 

This gargantuan figure down here:

They must be far too busy calculating

The light years to Mars.

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The Time It Takes published in Foliate Oak Literary Journal, March 2013