Rhythm, Recurrence, and Direction
Cycles, echoes, and irreversible processes suggest different movements in poetic time.
Cycles, oscillations, and echoes suggest recurrence with different timings and strengths. Refrains in “Carnot’s Eternal Cycle” and “The Atomic Rondo” return within changing contexts, so familiar words acquire new weight.
Vowels, consonants, stresses, and rhymes can carry a relationship. A delayed rhyme may suggest a returning signal; repeated phrases can shorten as an echo fades. The source supplies a relationship, while the poet finds the sounds.
Irreversibility suggests a movement that cannot simply be retraced. In “The Arrow of Entropy,” lengthening lines accompany spreading ink. Pace, line length, and image order allow the reader to experience the direction of change.
Web reading edition adapted from Part I, section 4.2, of the revised English manuscript of Schrödinger’s Cat.