Halley's Comet   Photograph by James Balog Of the thousands of known comets in the solar system, Halley's comet is one of some 200 that are periodic. Halley's comet orbits Earth every 76 years; the next flyby will occur in 2061.

Who Hath Known 

The Mind Of Nature?

When the divine Julius Caesar chose not

to heed the warning, his dying influence as

DIVVS IVLIVS moved the very cosmos

to deliver a message of grief as a comet

streaked along the prostrated universe 

in honour of the dead.  From Tycho Brae to

Carl Sagan, comets have been heavenly

messengers whose presentation we have

yet to fully decipher.  Logic and astrophysics

tell us minerals, dust particles and frozen gases

illuminated through atmospheric abrasion.

Those more finely acquainted with the arcana

of outer space know of "the star of offended

divinity", evidence of an intelligence aghast

at the forbidden actions of those given breath

and the whisper of greatness brought low

by the misery of human treachery in brutal

haste, then rearing back in horror of what

they have achieved, although in antique

verity, "not all that terrifies, harms"