The Heart of Nothing

The universe equals zero. Nothing. I heard so on NPR.

If you pull up the four corners of the universe like a quilt, it equals zero. Zero. Nothing.

It makes sense.

Trivial. Of little consequence. No thing. Not anything. Nonexistent.

A thing that does not exist.

Like a wife or a lover.

Once the universe, but pulled up like a quilt, she is nothing.

So what becomes of the Nile and Niagara Falls? Where does the rain forest go? What of Mount McKinley? London? Are the red, double-decker buses still running? Is the hungover saxophonist still wailing on Bourbon Street? Are the pilgrims buying carved cedar souvenirs in Bethlehem?

The heart of nothing is everything-all that is, all that was, all that will be.

Absolute zero-- throbbing, whole, full.