It is only because of the possibility of loss,
Of the irreparable erasure of information,
The permanent vanishing of pattern,
And only as such, not just material exchange,
That anything changes at all, and it is only
As varying rates of change that anything
Exists at all, and it is gravity that is nothing,
That is the ultimate eater of pattern,
That allows the draw-down from a higher
To a lower state of entropy that is
The vanishing of information by which
Time is real and unidirectional, or else
And without which nothing would be,
While thanks to which nothing will be,
Or rather, thanks to the nothing which is,
Everything is. The ghost looked at me
Solemnly as we paused in our drive along
The shoreline road. Thanks for the lift,
He added, I get out here. Here was nothing
But a flat expanse of water, shimmering,
The surface of Black Lake, rumored
To contain a drowned town in its depths,
Rumored to show during droughts just
The bell tower of a church above its surface.
But I let him out of the car and he limped
Cautiously, as if afraid of falling, to the edge
That was rimmed with a thin line of ice,
Then walked straight down into the water
And kept walking until he disappeared.
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