Bewilderment

by Richard Powers

One last purple rib of sun lined the ridges to the west. The forested mountainsides, having inhaled all day long, now began to breathe back out again.

from Buddhism, the Four Immeasurables. “There are four good things worth practicing. Being kind toward everything alive. Staying level and steady. Feeling happy for any creature anywhere that is happy. And remembering that any suffering is also yours.”

THEY SHARE A LOT, ASTRONOMY AND CHILDHOOD. Both are voyages across huge distances. Both search for facts beyond their grasp. Both theorize wildly and let possibilities multiply without limits. Both are humbled every few weeks. Both operate out of ignorance. Both are mystified by time. Both are forever starting out.

We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers.

“The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence.”

Which is bigger, outer space or inner?