Capture

by Spacepenguin

To the humans down on the planet’s surface, the vast blackness between the stars of the night sky appeared empty. They could not see. Even if they could, they would not be able to comprehend the timeless battles that were spinning above their heads.
Gracefully, silently and invisibly, the colossal force swooped around planets, danced through gaseous clouds and weaved its way between asteroid fields. The only clue to its existence is the faint flickering of the distant stars as it passes between them and the ignorant observers on earth.
Briefly, it pauses. It’s senses alerted to the presence of its prey. A new star is being born and there, just on the outer fringes of the glow is the tiniest of lights. The predator begins its approach. It has to be careful not to startle its victim but it also has to be quick. Once the star reaches its full brightness the tiny light will be almost impossible to see and the chance of a quick capture will be gone and the chase will begin again.
With all the power of a black hole it wraps itself around the infant star encompassing the tiny light and begins to squeeze. Tighter and tighter, the star itself becoming compressed under the immense pressure. The tiny light and the infant star have now become one intense point of brilliance. Tighter still, tighter and brighter, smaller and ….

* * *

Down on the planet’s surface a small white room is filled with a busy optimism. Two humans wearing light blue robes and facemasks are focused on a semi-naked woman. With one final push, one of the enrobed takes hold of a small wriggling lump of flesh. As soon as it can feel the air there is a moment of realisation, this is a new experience that it does not like. It has been caught and this body will serve as its prison. The tiny light gives out a cry; the new born baby cries.

© Spacepenguin 2009

Inspired by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
Ode: Intimations Of Immortality From Recollections Of Early Childhood

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature’s Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.