Infinite Worlds
The limitless content of our universe might be only
one instance of a large (and possibly infinite) number
of other universes.
—Astronomer Seth Shostak,
Director of the Center for SETI Research
When you lift your fork an infinite number of yous
all lift their forks at the same instant and an infinite number
are missing their mouths and an infinite number are choking
on the tines and an infinite number are being struck by meteors
and vaporized and an infinite number are being trampled by
cattle or time-traveling mammoths or naked strippers
who look like Martha Washington and an infinite number
of the strippers are sprouting purple wings just as Christ
is coming back in the form of an infinite number of small green aliens
who are explaining they are a poetry collective
that specializes in holographs
and apologizing for the cultural disruption their guy-on-the-cross
experiment made and that fork keeps rising and rising and destroying
everything in its path as you commit suicide an infinite number
of times and give birth to an infinite number of babies who drown
in an infinite number of great rivers 150 miles wide which suddenly
appear out of nowhere carrying schools of voracious piranhas
who devour an infinite number of yous forks
before they turn into infinite numbers of gold, rats
hairpins and hockey sticks
because
when there are an infinite number of worlds anything can
happen and will an infinite number of times which is why
the idea of infinity like all things that have no limits
is impossible to grasp even in your own kitchen over a plate
of fried potatoes with a red-handled stainless steel
fork