Digital Creation

Darkness. Silence. Void.

Start with a single point.
Stark white, it hangs immobile, untwinkling.

Let it expand…

The dot swells, writhes, and
Bursts into a galaxy of multicoloured stars
That rush madly past, streaming and pulsating as they whirl,
Then slow.

More calmly now, a planet approaches,
A blue-green sphere wreathed in haze;
Alien in its crystalline perfection,
It is yet eerily familiar.

Descending, the clouds part
To reveal a rich panorama:
Rocky heights become lush forests which slope gently down
To sparkling seas, and the coral depths below.

On the ground, the view diversifies;
Strange creatures move; large scaly tripeds
Stalk among the spiny trees with probing eyes,
While tiny winged shells hum and hover
Above a fizzing stream,

Within whose cool tranquillity
Myriad protozoans flit and wheel;

Smaller still, the very water dances,
A chaos of insubstantial particles.

The vision vanishes.
But the numbers which created it remain
In timeless limbo.

Wonderful, that from two blank digits
Such splendour can arise.

Reuben Thomas
Winchester, 25th–31st January 1992

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This document was translated from L^AT_EX by H^EV^EA.

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Last updated 2019/10/28