Retrodictions, canto 3, quatrain 4

I turn the key, release the brake;
two hundred horses roar with power;
but traffic only lets me make
a torpid forty miles an hour.

Commentary by Brother Quark:
Though blessed with power, these sorcerers are cursed with impatience.

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about automobiles.

Retrodictions, canto 3, quatrain 3

In one direction, deeds conspire;
forever lost is last year’s rose;
the frost will never warm the fire;
for tiny chaos always grows.

Commentary by Brother Quark:

A meditation on transience, culminating in strange metaphysics.

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about the second law of thermodynamics; the increase of entropy.

Retrodictions, canto 3, quatrain 2

In a self-moving counting board, errors may lurk;
tell its music and pictures and games how to run;
then its sand and its logic and lightning shall work
for the master mechanics of nothing and one.
 
Commentary by Brother Quark:
Sorcery!

 Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about computers and their programmers.

Retrodictions, canto 3, quatrain 1

Let all creatures compete for their needs

and let Nature select from the strife;
let their fitness survive in their seeds;
then an aeon breeds new forms of life.

Commentary by Brother Quark:
More paganism.

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about evolution by natural selection.

Retrodictions, canto 2, quatrain 10

The Porcelain Throne! O hole-some seat!

O honest chair approached in haste!
For public health, relief, retreat;
all other thrones, compared, are waste!

Commentary by Brother Quark:

This gives proper honor to the spotless and rock-solid Papacy.

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about indoor plumbing.

Retrodictions, canto 2, quatrain 9

Fair Nature’s fresh and blooming bower

is elder far than it appears.
It took to breed a single flower
a thousand thousand thousand years.
 

Commentary by Brother Quark:

This understates the age of the Earth; a mere three thousand years, when we know that it is twice as old as that.
 

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about evolutionary deep time. It understates the age of  the Earth; a mere billion years, when we know that it is 4.5 times as old as that.

Retrodictions, canto 2, quatrain 8

 

The dark room opens; let’s convene

and loads of dough be sure to bring
to gaze upon the silver screen
where colored shadows dance and sing.

Commentary by Brother Quark:

This refers to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.

Commentary by N. Hellerstein:

This is about the cinema.