Explanation: Q: Why are black holes black? A: Because they have an event horizon. The event horizon is that one-way boundary predicted by general relativity beyond which nothing, not even light, can return. X-ray astronomers using the space-based Chandra Observatory now believe they have direct evidence for event horizons - therefore black holes - in binary star systems which can be detected in x-ray light. These binaries, sometimes called x-ray novae, are known to consist of relatively normal stars dumping material on to massive, compact companions. As illustrated, the material swirls toward the companion in an accretion disk which itself glows in x-rays. If the compact companion is a neutron star (right), the material ultimately smashes into the solid surface and glows even more brightly in high energy x-rays. But if it is indeed a black hole with a defining event horizon, then the x-ray hot material approaches the speed of light as it swirls past the surface of no return and is lost from view. Recent work describes observations of two classes of x-ray binaries, one class 100 times fainter than the other. The results imply the presence of an event horizon in the fainter class which causes the extreme difference in x-ray brightness.
Here's a poem by John Tarrant:
THE LIGHT BENEATH SLEEP
Sometimes, underneath deep sleep
is a certain diffused glow,
as, in the rainforest, luminous toadstools
glow green among the leaf litter
and beetles crawl about with winking abdomens.
One night when I followed this glow
I came to an upturned tree
that was a kind of cathedral for glowworms
and the light beat against my face, my chest and my hands.
At the end of the corridor of sleep, a dream stands.
It may be that at the end of the corridor of death
there is the walking slightly uphill
through the green fields;
and then the light underneath sleep
is both in front and behind.
- John Tarrant
The presence of cream is great in small doses. I sicken with too much of it. That is true for butter too. This would not be an issue except that my desire to enjoy the cream and butter tastes overloads my ass, as they say. However, I am able to eat quite large dollops of vanilla ice cream, and then do it again. I haven't actually found the limit. Of course I haven't had any ice cream for at least a couple months now and know that for reasons of health, never again except just a taste maybe now and then. I quite frankly would rather totally abstain than eat a smattering of ice cream. Actually a smattering of anything I really enjoy just pisses me off.
Fresh Thick Cream
Such a heavy rich
flow like fresh thick cream across
my palate working
into the deep heart
of love bursting forth,
my display intended for
your eyes and savor,
to anchor the truth.
August 4, 2009 12:30 PM
I hear you, it's sort of like that nursery rhyme that goes something like
ReplyDelete"seamentary tombstones half of unlabeled until the second of the two halfs dies " and it seems straight forward as his'n'her tombstones won't have the d-date chipped in until they both are dead and the cemented snail trails from your puppy dogs tail leave a bad taste for a win-wahl crown.
and I couldn't help thinking that maybe you meant Gamma-rays , cause then it seems like the star theory *might* make enough sense to hold water in the phasion of that of a seive
word verify is "whowdyin" who how who'd and why did you piss someone off today? and then Michael Diamond says "I didn't but I know he did!"
I just grinned is what I said
"Actually a smattering of anything I really enjoy just pisses me off." I unfortunately live this way, which lends itself to huge waves of overindulgence, oh, every day.
ReplyDeleteYour poem moves slowly across the tongue and darkly toward the throat as though there are time and space convulutions involved.
My uncle's love suffered from throat cancer in the end. She could eat nothing for the last few years of her life. No.thing. My eyes narrow as though I try to see this clearly when I think of this. It makes no sense to me. No.sense.
xo
erin
Dirt, I apparently threw something right down your alley in this one, which suits me just fine. :D
ReplyDeleteErin, (a) According to AA I am not allowed the arrogance to diagnose anyone but I would warn you away from any really determined use of drugs or alcohol. (b) The appearance of a black hole, a neutron star, alcoholic sized overindulgence, and erotic sensory overload in the same blog post is in itself so overdone that it smacks of melodrama. (c) You have found the tie between yesterday's post and today's discussing throat cancer...which sounds particularly gross. I knew someone who died of that too. My aunt's brain cancer was a metastasized lung cancer, and was a mercy for her, very quick in the end and with not much actual pain. (d) If you read your last paragraph as the poetry you easily can write, then your uncle's love is your uncle's ability to love which could eat nothing for the last few years before dying completely, a particularly compelling vision of your uncle living an impoverished human existence.
A Terrible Fate
ReplyDeleteMy love has sickened,
has become a throat cancer
which (choking my words
when I try to tell
you how much I cherish you)
stops my swallowing
motions, refusing
me essential sustenance.
It will perish, then
I will so I shall
wander off in my need of
another life soon.
For me, the first bite of anything is the most delicious. With each succeeding mouthful I am less grateful and less aware. I become used to the flavor and the texture. There is no longer surprise and delight, simply the ritual to finish. I like the first bite, the first kiss, first sight of something new. Big fan of firsts.
ReplyDeleteAnnie, Are you Aries or Libra? Or perhaps have emphasis on first or seventh houses? Context matters but this feels like that self and other axis. Less likely is Martian planetary emphasis, or Venusian.
ReplyDeleteYou're talkin over my head Christopher. But I am Aries...on the cusp. April 19.
ReplyDeleteHeh. Another Aries Annie. No wonder you are familiar to me. It was the part about starting things and not finishing (with the same enthusiasm, needing another way to look at the task if to continue). The way you fade into routine so easily. But Water and Earth would not do that even when Cardinal. It is really mainly a trait of Cardinal Fire. Even Libra Air is distant second to Aries. That tendency is just about the key one for Aries. The beginnings and endings of signs typically strengthen the qualities too. The 19th is usually the 28th degree or so, and not really the cusp so much but is quite late in the sign. This means the Aries in you is flaring up like a candle flame at the end of its life flares up.
ReplyDeleteMy wife was April 17.
ReplyDeleteMore so for my uncle than you know. More than I know, too, of course.
ReplyDeleteAnd now the cancer eats him from the bottom up. It climbs his leg. Soon it will fill the home that they shared.
(a: I hear your warning.)
xo
erin
Erin, I am saddened to know that your uncle is going through this travail. We all die of something I guess, but some of these are really unkind.
ReplyDeleteI am saddened that you have to watch such a thing.
I am glad to know you get it about your own indulgences, what to stay away from.
Am I dying?
ReplyDeleteBut of course
:D Annie, people would say more about you that you flare up easily and show enthusiasm in extraordinary ways, not that you are involved so much in dying, however, it is obvious that you have been dying since day one. So have we all.
ReplyDelete