University of California, San Diego
Center for Astrophysics & Space Sciences


CASS Astronomy Tutorial

Neutrinos - Cosmic Gall by John Updike

COSMIC GALL

- John Updike -

Neutrinos, they are very small.
They have no charge and have no mass
And do not interact at all.
The earth is just a silly ball
To them, through which they simply pass,
Like dustmaids through a drafty hall
Or photons through a sheet of glass.
They snub the most exquisite gas,
Ignore the most substantial wall,
Cold-shoulder steel and sounding brass,
Insult the stallion in his stall,
And scorning barriers of class,
Infiltrate you and me! Like tall
And painless guillotines, they fall
Down through our heads into the grass.
At night, they enter at Nepal
And pierce the lover and his lass
From underneath the bed - you call
It wonderful; I call it crass.

from Telephone Poles and Other Poems by John Updike © Knopf 1963