RIVAL MODELS

Cassiopeia, scintillant and lean,
Steps slowly skyward,
Diamond-visored,
And reclines serene.

In beauty so resplendent and restrained
She rises crueler,
And the ardent jeweler
Treats with disdain.

But arrayed in ether,
Her cold allure will lose
To a rival beneath her
Whom the man will choose.

The groping artisan prefers
Not perfection, high and unknown,
But Galatea, palpable in stone,
Galatea, who melts and defers.

IS LOVE AN EQUATION?

Is Love an equation?
Consider its constraints:
Variables of impulse and evasion,
Bounds of exhilaration and restraint,
Fear is a constant
To be displaced
In the elusiveness of the embraced.

The mathematician, Galois, proved the ultimate gall,
Assuming not that love was there to find,
But that romance could not be found at all,
Except in cases rare and narrowly defined.