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Posts Tagged ‘butterfly effect’

The Night Before the Big Decision

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on August 19, 2026| 2 Comments »


 
 
There is the moment when the woman 
is deciding what to make for dinner—
a tofu curry with beet greens from the garden?
Or maybe guacamole with all those avocados
she bought on sale. When she reaches 
for the greens, that’s the kind of moment
when a Greek goddess doesn’t appear beside her
and shake her head as if everything depends
on the woman choosing the guac. 
Something wonderful about a choice 
with so little consequence. Red socks or blue? 
The low green vase or the clear vase from Finland?
The woman has read about the butterfly effect,
trusts a life—in fact all of civilization—is built 
on every smallest choice and inaction.
But tonight there is peace in the way she presses
water from the tofu, then slides the white cubes
into the pan. Six seven, as the kids would say.
The scent of turmeric fills the room. 
If a goddess were to show up, she’d probably
just ask for a glass of sauv blanc and join
the woman for a bowl of curry. They would 
sit at the kitchen table for hours, laughing
as the cats chase each other across the room,
talking about the three-hour movie they just saw.
Tomorrow, the choice. But tonight,
the goddess nods at the sunflowers on the table.
“I like your low green vase,” she says.  

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Butterfly Effect

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on April 19, 2021| Leave a Comment »






At first I hear only the fan.
The hum of the fridge.
The whine of a faraway motor.
I wait. I listen a long time
until I hear the slightest silence
from thirty years ago
when that butterfly wing in China
didn’t flap and so the weather didn’t change
and so until this moment,
the woman today didn’t know
that she was missing so much laughter
thirty years ago.

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After Talking to Michelle, I Think of Dynamic Systems

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on September 21, 2013| 1 Comment »

Predictability: Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?
—Edward Lorenz, title of a paper presented at the 139th Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (29 Dec 1979), in Essence of Chaos (1995)

Let’s say the rainbow
lands in a field. The woman
watching it knows her treasure
is elsewhere. Still, she takes it
as a sign. Sure, there are other signs.
The beetle in the screen door. Two
white feathers. A cloud in the shape
of a shoe. Everything means
what she wants it to. She remembers
the words of Edward Lorenz: how the present
determines the future, but
the approximate present does not
approximately determine the future.
In the field, there are no butterflies
present, at least none that she can see.
Sensitivity to initial conditions,
she whispers under her breath,
wondering if just that tiny puff
of memory is enough to create
the next storm. There are rainbows
everywhere, she says to herself.
Where will the next one land?

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From Only a Few Hundred Miles Away

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on February 25, 2012| 1 Comment »

If a butterfly flutter in Brazil
can cause a Texas tornado
no wonder
I felt on the wind today
your hands

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