poetry | Kelsey Ellis

Dinoflagellate; the combination of the Greek δῖνος/dinos, “whirling” and Latin flagellum, “whip, scourge.”

Dinoflagellates. Source: blueoceanemporium.blogspot.com

I recently ran across a poem, written back in 2001 by a scientist named Mary Harrington who was in the midst of some phytoplankton research. She published her poem, transcribed below, in the Journal of Biological Rhythms. Science to follow!

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FEEDBACK

If the lazy dinoflagellate

should lay abed

refuse to photosynthesize

realize:

the clock will not slow

but it will grow faint

weaker

barely whispering at the end

“rise”

to little effect.

The recalcitrant Gonyaulax

arms crossed

snorts

“No longer will

they call my life

(my life!)

‘just hands.’

I am sticking to the sea bed!”

—

I’m honestly so happy with this–the combination of poetry and science (I’m also kind of a phytoplankton nerd, which doesn’t hurt). Mary took her research–looking at the circadian rhythms and bioluminescence of the dinoflagellate Gonyaulax polyedra–and created art. Dinoflagellates are a type of phytoplankton, characterized by whip-like appendages called flagellum which they use to move around in the water. Mary’s specific dinoflagellate–the aforementioned Gonyaulax–enters a “resting stage” at a certain point in its life cycle. Gonyaulax, acting on temperature or salinity cues, forms a heavy ‘dinocyst’ and sinks swiftly to the seafloor. There it remains, dormant and sedentary, until changes in the surrounding ocean awaken it again. If left undisturbed, some resting dinoflagellate dinocysts can remain alive for over 100 years.

How amazingly improbable it all seems. Now go back and read the poem again, knowing Gonyaulax a little bit better. Science is poetry; I just can’t get over it. I love it and I want more of it.