Wilderspool Causeway

Smoking on the jetty, smoking in the loading bay,
smoking in the sands of Western Australia
in bloodwood by the widefield array.

Smoking in the quiet radio environment
picking up transient phenomena in outer space,
smoking by the analogue transformer

in the backyards of improvised cafes
by the correlator boards and cross-multiplied signals.

Smoking on the supercomputer, the inside areas,
breathing in the metadata,
smoking in the Square Kilometre,
putting feelers out for the Cosmic Dawn.

Smoking on the low-noise amplifier:
smoking to slightly hasten the time
with a wide field of view across the phased tiles.

Smoking just inside the Haystack,
underneath the low-band instruments
in the radio quiet zone, the cosmic microwave
between dark matter and baryons.

Smoking in the red-shift indeterminate,
the Sun’s declination in the desert
from its midday reference at the zenith.

Smoking in the loading bays, the supercomputer,
smoking on the jetty, the wooden piers
between local tropics, immediate debris.

Smoking in the Antipodes – you get the picture –
off by the shrubs for a lower culmination
back formation meridian-transit
of satellite maps of Pinnacles and distant plasma tubes.