Herzfeld's Ghost
by Francis J. Kelly

Beneath cool autumn's sunlit skies
When leaves form golden mounds,
His light brown niece with smiling eyes
And Frank made tourist rounds.

Since she had come to Washington
To study in a college,
He took her to some sites he knew
To help increase her knowledge.

As they drove to each noble view
Of stately Washington,
They paused to view a shrine he knew
At Fourth and Michigan.

This is a large and gracious church
A truly "National Shrine,"
Where pilgrims came to pray and search
For peace and aid, divine.

Seen from outside, the church looks huge-
With dome and tower, awesome.
Gray walls enclose this strong refuge
For peaceful prayer in autumn.

A massive dome, the walls uphold
Above the building's center.
All tiled in blue, red, white and gold,
It beckoned them to enter.

The dome is decked with David's star
And many holy signs
That speak to those who, from afar,
Admire its gracious lines.

Beside the church, they parked his car
And went around before.
The tower on the left rose far
And, to the sky, did soar.

They clambered up the broad front stairs
And entered in the door
To see a view of Christ that glares
With anger 'round the floor.

On entering, she gave a gasp
To see Christ's angry face.
With arm upraised His frown would blast
The damned to hell's disgrace.

This scene of Christ in Judgment says
"Take care!" to us who fall.
It shows the Lord, in rage, upraise
His arm to blast us all.

Before the menace of His face,
A smaller statue stands.
It is so mild, and in its place
It softly shows its hands.

There, rays of grace fall from the hands
Of Mary, Queen of Saints.
They fall on all the global lands
Our sinful nature taints.

Frank knew the place, for he'd oft’ dressed
To usher there before,
And, when the church had first been blessed,
Was stationed at the door.

They passed along the colonnades,
As he described each cult
That, to the Virgin, past parades
Of popes did grant indult.

They walked with reverence and would kneel,
In peace, to pray for grace,
Then went below to buy a meal
To fill their empty space.

At dinner, she, with dark brown eyes,
Told Uncle Frank, that day,
"My teacher says 'Your priests tell lies;
And you should never pray.'

"She claims, ‘Religion is a lie;
And scientists don't pray‘.
She says, ‘We live until we die
And then, just pass away.'

"She thinks no woman needs a child
Or love for any man.
A girl should lead a life that's wild
As whore and lesbian.

"This college teacher says, in class,
'All things are relative,
For Einstein has refuted faith
And shown us how to live.'

"This is my first exposure to
This atheistic style
Of teacher, who have come to rule
The academic pile.

"What can I say to answer her
And help my fellow youth
To find the way that will ensure
Adherence to the truth?"

Then Uncle Frank, his interest fanned,
Insisted quietly,
"Your teacher does not understand
Old Einstein's destiny.

"We've learned that, from his life, as one,
Who led all in his time,
We can deduce that we should shun
Such thoughts that lead to crime."

"But Uncle Frank," she said, dismayed,
"You hardly can resist,
For Einstein bears the accolade
Of 'Greatest Physicist.'"

Then Uncle's mind sought for a sign
As he fought for a grip:
"Let's stroll some more about this shrine,
For you've not seen the crypt."

And so they passed up to the front
Of the Shrine's lower floor
Through the great hall, where faithful hunt
For names inscribed before.

They passed into the lower church,
Where Christ lives, day and night.
The Uncle prayed somehow his search
For truth would bring a light.

While in this quiet reverie,
In answer to his sighs,
A shape with ghostly mystery
Appeared before their eyes.

The spirit cloaked in black, with hood
Of gold and white, was decked.
His nose was long; his white hair would
A halo's light reflect.

His gentle smile and friendly eyes
Allayed the fear and dread
That did in uncle's heart arise
To meet one from the dead.

And, Uncle Frank, he rubbed his eyes
That opened in amaze
"Dear niece, I think I recognize
This ghost from college days.

"I prayed for help but could not guess
That it would come so fast.
This ghost, in academic dress,
Emerges from my past.

"Speak Ghost! We hear," the uncle said.
His voice with fear was shaking.
"What message have you from the dead?
What lesson for our taking?"

Then over them a coolness spread.
The spirit, like a flame,
Relayed dread tidings from the dead.
Karl Herzfeld was his name.

And with his very strong accent,
This tale he was to tell:
“It is from heaven I am sent
To help you stay from hell.

"Your prayer is heard; and from on high
I'm sent to bring you word
To counteract the wretched lie
That builds the devil's herd.

"I am Herzfeld, who served nearby,
At University
And physics did profess 'til I
Retired from faculty."

And Uncle Frank was glad to see
His teacher from his youth,
Who taught him science history
And always spoke the truth.

Said Uncle Frank, "I recognize
You now Professor, dear.
You taught me how to theorize
And make a lecture clear.

"You were a colleague of Einstein.
But you, a younger man,
Had left from Europe earlier.
Both were of Jewish clan.

"Your face and name and family
Portrayed your Jewish race;
But often you devotedly
Would pray in this same place.

"For many times I did observe
You and your wife, Regina,
Receive the precious sacrament
And pray a short novena.

"I know you fought in Serbia
For Deutschland in the war
That did begin the century
That passes out the door.

"At Munich University
In prostrate Germany
You finished up your Ph. D.
After the victory.

"To find a better life, you left;
And, to the U. S. A.,
You came to work at physics craft
And get a decent pay.

"You came in nineteen twenties, when
The world had found some peace;
And, at Johns Hopkins, you began
To research and to teach..

"But, in dispute about the way
They treated Mrs. Mayer,
You threatened that you would not stay,
If more they would not pay her.

"They called your bluff; and so you left
And came to Catholic's school,
Where you persisted at your craft
And honed your physics tool.

"A strong department, you built up,
While men from overseas,
Did emigrate from old Europe
As if it had disease."

"Young Frank, I see you have perused
My life's biography"
Said Herzfeld's ghost, who seemed amused,
Then went on happily.

Then Herzfeld weaved this Einstein rhyme
To warn all of the lies
That often those, who teach, incline
To put before young eyes.

"From far on high, I have been sent
To bring this information.
Our Lady asks all to repent
And have a transformation.

"She sends me here to undeceive
The world about Einstein,
And says to let no one believe
That he should lead the line.

"She is upset that liars try
To place Albert Einstein
Above the saints, who stayed to die
Like Holy Gertrude Stein.

"For ye who hear, this rhyme is wrought
To tell of proud Einstein,
Who gained renown for his great thought
But ended in decline.

"In Ulm, this prince of pure research,
The great Albert Einstein,
Was bom on the fourteenth of March
In eighteen sev'nty nine.

"At home, Pauline, his mother, dear,
Adored her man, Hermann,
Whose brother, Jake, could engineer,
Like Edison or Swann.

"So Hermann joined his brother, Jake,
And left the feather trade.
They then a partnership did make;
And all, in Munich, stayed.

"For Jake had patented a light
And power meter, too.
They made Octoberfest so bright,
Each night, to show the brew.

"They prospered for a little while
And bought some other firms.
But then, at last, their business pile
Collapsed like most concerns.

"They sold their works and pulled up stakes,
And set off to Milan,
Where Albert learned Italian cakes
Are sweet and good for man.

"When Einsteins moved to Munich, he
Was just a babe of one.
But when they left for Italy,
His life was well begun.

"Young Albert's speech was slow to come;
But between two and three
Full sentences he spoke, not dumb,
And talked both loud and free.

"He was a self-willed little guy,
Whose violence was known
To cause his sister injury
And chased a tutor home.

"One day when little Al was ill,
His kindly dad did bring
A magnet compass that would fill
His mind with wondering.

"His father and his mother, though,
As freethinkers, were known.
To Jewish practice, they said 'No!'
And did not pray at home.

"Young Albert was, by them, enrolled
At Munich's Catholic school,
Where he did well; for we are told
He was not thought a fool.

"But then his parents did permit
Someone, perhaps a sister,
To teach religion to their kid
Preparing for bar mitzvah.

"But a young man, [Max Talmud— named]
Was then a science scholar.
And weekly he was entertained
At dinner and their parlor.

"He filled young Albert's head with thought
That science, not religion,
Alone is true; and thus he brought
Young Al to a decision.

"And it was then that Albert chose
To leave his Jewish faith;
Max Talmud showed, you can suppose,
A smile upon his face.

"For later, when Einstein became
The world's most famous Jew,
Max wrote a book and felt no shame,
But thought it right to do."

At that Frank's niece did interrupt
Old Herzfeld, urgently,
"This is the same thing my corrupt
Young teacher tried with me."

"But now I see her scorn's not based
On relativity,
For Albert had not yet embraced
Or taught this new theory.

"It was just based on violent
And mindless opposition
To those who are obedient
To laws and to tradition."

"Indeed, my dear," Herzfeld replied.
"You now can see the light.
You understand your teacher lied
And leads you wrong for spite.

"And now I hope you do not mind
This story to continue,
For many morals you will find,
Which you can keep within you..

"While seeking fame, Einstein found shame
And secrets still are kept.
His anger caused a lot of pain
And acts he did regret.

"Young Albert loved the violin.
At six he was to start;
But only when he was thirteen,
Did Mozart steal his heart.

"So at thirteen, he grew enthralled
And started in to play
Duets with kith and kin for all
The lovely girls of May.

"He grew to be a handsome man,
With wavy hair endowed.
His large brown eyes would always scan
For beauty in a crowd.

"At the gymnasium his stews
With teachers brought him pain.
Except for classes with Herr Ruess,
He loudly would complain.

"Al was advanced in math'matics.
He loved geometry;
And he could pass his French and Greek,
But not exceptionally.

"To let young Albert dodge the draft,
His father signed a slip,
Which did reject, on his behalf,
His German cit'zenship.

"So it is true that young Einstein
Escaped the Kaiser's reach;
But later he did not decline,
In German schools, to teach.

"After their move to fair Milan,
His parents thought Albert
Should enter school in Switzerland,
To study for his work.

"There was a rule at Zurich school,
That one should be eighteen
Before the taking of the test
That was a student screen.

"So Albert, free, in Italy,
Prepared to take the test.
And he averred he much preferred
Italian life the best.

"Young Albert then, at last, went in
To take the test, although
He only was sixteen-and then
He couldn't pass it-whoa."

The niece exclaimed, "I see, at last,
He was a scholar student.
The tales that claimed he was not fast
Were just a misconstrument.

"It seems indeed this brash young one,
With great ability,
Had grades and recommendation
To sway the faculty."

Then Herzfeld said, "You are correct.
He studied hard to pass
The tests that helped the school select
The ones to let in class.

"Instead of going to the school
In Zurich on that day,
He was enrolled in Aarau’s school
Some thirty miles away.

"His host was named Jost Winteler,
Who taught the classic Greek
And Latin in the Arrau school,
And often they would speak.

"At Arrau school he did prepare
To enter Zurich school.
He learned his French and Greek, right there,
And did obey their rule.

"This seemed a happy time for him,
For, at the Wintelers,
He fell in love and did begin
His reaching for the stars.

"Jost's girl, Marie, then just eighteen,
With Einstein, was enamored;
But after, Zurich, he had seen,
She found her love had floundered."

"You mean," she said, "that Albert had
Abandoned her affection?"
"That's right, my child," Karl Herzfeld said,
"This caused her some dejection.

"When Einstein was in Switzerland,
At Zurich, as a student,
He met a young Serb lady; and
They did what was not prudent.

"Mileva had, from Novi Sad,
Come to the science center,
At Zurich, where Swiss custom had
Permitted her to enter.

"This girl, Mileva Maric, was
A scholar in her time.
Her path in science stopped because
She loved the proud Einstein.

"He took up with Mileva then
And studied physics with her.
They both did take their big exam;
And neither was a quitter.

"But Albert came in fourth, and passed;
Mileva, fifth, and failed.
They hoped next year she'd pass at last;
But sadly she was nailed.

"Brash Albert was without a job
And living with a Serb.
His mother grew quite livid, sobbed,
This rash affair to curb.

"Alas! When Nature showed her strength,
Mileva, who was wild,
Went home to parents, where, at length,
She did produce their child.

"When Albert did set off for Bern,
Mileva had the girl.
He was delighted and did learn
They named her Lieserl.

"They loved the baby and were glad—
At least for a short day.
But while she was at Novi Sad,
Lieserl was sent away.

"And so this daughter of Einstein
Remains a mystery,
For no one knows where he might find
Her life's full history.

"Though she is known to God quite well
He does not choose to say
What happened to this girl or tell
Her fate 'til judgment day.

"Then all the stories of the past
We'll see before our eyes.
Then every sin and grace, at last,
We'll know without men's lies..

"At Bern, her father spent some time
As tutor in his field.
This did his friends named Solovine
And, also, Habicht, yield.

"First Solovine took lessons from
Einstein, in his small flat;
But later he became his chum;
And weekly they would chat.

"The group they formed read physics and
Philosophy and Greek.
They read great books to understand
The wisdom they would seek.

"Grandiloquent, they seemed to be,
As they ate cheese and soup.
"Olympia Academy"
Was what they called their group.

"Before too long young Albert had,
With Marcel Grossman's help,
Obtained a job and felt so glad
To be a man, not whelp.

"So, after waiting for a term,
Young Albert did obtain
A patent office post in Bern—
And this was quite a gain.

"He started work and tried to get
His parents to agree
That he could wed his pretty pet;
But tough this proved to be.

"Pauline was hard and stopped her son
From marrying his girl,
Although they knew it should be done
For sake of Lieserl.

"But very soon, Hermann grew ill.
And-- on his deathbed--said
That Albert should his aim fulfill
Then, very soon, was dead..

"Albert told young Mileva then,
And soon the two were wed.
The Einsteins felt quite happy, when
They legally could bed.

"On Three Kings Day in nineteen three,
Al and Mileva married.
And then they did as spouses, free,
And soon, two babies, carried.

"Mileva trusted Albert's word
And, to two sons, gave birth.
Thus Hans Albert and Edouard
Arrived to walk the earth.

"For seven years, young Albert would
His patent work, pursue.
A steady job, and it felt good
To have two sons-yes two!

"Young Albert wanted to inquire
In topics deep and heady.
These fundamental subjects were,
For his attention, ready."

"Professor Karl," his niece exclaimed,
"If he was such a dastard,
 How is that the world acclaimed
This father of a bastard?"

"I think the answer Karl will give
To your perceptive question,"
Said Uncle Frank, "is Al did live
With moral indigestion.

"He came to take a view of life
That holds that God, alone,
At once, did make all things exist
Then left it all alone.

"So nature follows naturally
The laws that God has hidden;
But humans in humanity
Have naught to them forbidden.

"This is a style of thought that splits
The world in hemispheres.
Thus beauty's seen in nature's fits;
But life yields death and tears.

"Bernard Spinoza's Ethics was
The book he chose to read.
It did support his life, because
It rationalized this creed."

"And so his thoughts on nature smacked
Of beauty and repose;
But humans, when they virtues, lacked,
Would make him hold his nose.

"At times we marvel how he worked,
The mind of God, to fathom;
But it repels that he was jerked
About by his wild passion.

"For in his thoughts, he found repose
In orderly relations;
But in his acts, his story shows
Succumbed to his temptations."

And Herzfeld's ghost replied, "Oh, yes.
Albert would not convert.    
But stayed in his Spinozan mess
And now must suffer hurt.

"For Jesus clearly offers all
The chance to follow Him;
But those who do reject His call
Will never heaven win.

"So we don't meet with Albert where
The Church Triumphant reigns.
In Purgatory none do share
Or hear about his pains.

"But Hell is rather just the place,
Where men all fear to pass.
There Albert found the proper space
For him to stay at last..

"To pray for him will do no good
For he's beyond all aid.
We only can, it's understood,
Help those whose sins are paid.

"Now I'll return to tell his life,
So you can comprehend
How from the stress and daily strife
He came to his bad end.

"Momentous was nineteen-oh-five (1905),
When Albert's mind could see
Four theories that still survive
Throughout the century.

"The first was relativity
And then, specific heat.
And Brownian motion made it three,
And photons, four. How neat!

"He published them in year ought five ('05);
And all saw, right away,
That a new talent was alive
And Al would have a say.

"So universities did plot
To find a place for him.
He got an academic spot
At Zurich to begin.

"His next big move to help improve
His life and status, too,
Was then a jog straight up to Prague
To gain a spot anew.

In Prague Mileva did complain
About the state of life.
She had two little ones and pain.
So Albert heard his wife.

"After a year in Prague, then back
To Zurich they did come.
And he improved his salary.
They paid him quite a sum.

"Then Prussian scientists were sure
To try to get Einstein
To take a Berlin sinecure,
So they could say ‘He's mine.’

"The most enticing thing Albert
Had found in old Berlin
Was cousin, Elsa, cute and pert,
And ready for a sin.

"She was the child of Fanny, who
Was sister to Pauline.
Pauline, his mother, wanted to
Have Elsa on the scene.

"Elsa already had divorced
One husband by that time.
So she was ready and not forced
To enter in the crime.

"It was in April of fourteen('14).
Mileva and her children
Were moved from Zurich to the scene
Of trouble in Berlin.

"For Elsa and Einstein had been
In secret correspondence.
She sent love letters, all unseen,
To Albert at his office.

"In June the separation came.
Mileva and the boys
Retreated from the field, in shame,
But not without some noise.

"Then back to Zurich, they did go
And hoped in grief and pain
That Albert, dear, would not be slow
To come to them again.

"Al made his wife and children
To go away by force;
So he had no firm basis, then,
To sue for a divorce.

"For clearly Al was in the wrong
To break the marriage vow,
That keeps all civil order strong.
(It sure is weakened now!)

"After some five long years of hash,
He got her to divorce;
But by it's terms, his Nobel cash
Would go to her in course.

"For five long years, war took its course
In family and world.
Mileva granted the divorce
But, many charges, hurled.

"It was a Pyrric victory
For Elsa and Albert.
Their marriage was not trouble-free.
Each one would feel much hurt.

"Pauline had wanted him to leave
Mileva in the fight.
She did not think that he should cleave
To "Dolly" in her sight.

"In nineteen twenty, Pauline tried
To live in Einstein's home
With Elsa; but she quickly died
With cancer in her bone.

"Death came as Albert shared his home
With Elsa and her brood.
She yearned to hold him as her own;
But Albert acted rude.

"For Albert, many women, had,
Throughout his second marriage.
He was a very brazen cad
And went out in their carriage.

"So Elsa suffered from the fate
That she had dealt her rival,
For Albert liked to woo and date
And was too hard to bridle.

"At least the two avoided all
The scandal of a breakup.
And Albert did regret his fall
And sought, its pain, to make up.

"But he did never meet the needs
Of sons and lawful wife.
Such bad behavior surely leads
To guilt for all one's life.

"For if Albert had kept within
And been his first wife's man,
He would not have been in Berlin
As World War One began.

"He would not have been asked to choose
To back the German nation,
As at the time he did refuse
To sign a declaration.

"He would not have become so sick,
For in the time of war,
The English fleet was set to starve
The Germans, all, for sure.

"If he, instead, in Switzerland
Did, married life, pursue,
He would not have by Hitler’s hand
Become a banished Jew.

"And then he would not have been forced
To flee the Nazi strength,
If he had stayed in Zurich, where
Mileva stayed at length.

"He could have served Edouard, his son,
Who soon became insane,
And was confined in asylum
To be his parents' pain.

"But rather Albert was enmeshed
In Germany's sad fate.
They lost the war when the U. S.'d
Come in when it was late.

"America's rich bankers loaned
Much cash to England's crew,
And when, to rest, the warfare groaned
They wanted back their due.

"So they influenced Wilson, who
Had run on Peace for sure,
And got the Congress to declare
The U. S. in the war.

"And so to get the money from
The Allies, men were sent
To die in ditches far from home
In trenches or in tent.

"For Einstein's friends had learned to pass
Their science to war's scene;
Herr Haber made a deadly gas-
The first use of chlorine.

"This caused a dreadful toll upon
Your boys, who died in trenches.
When chlorine gas would burn their lungs,
They died with awful wrenches.

"But if they were not dosed too much
And did survive exposure,
They still were hurt, like Mr. Nash,
And sure their war was over.

"But this was not all Einstein's fault.
He was a 'pacifist.'
But he was in the Kaiser's vault
And, in Berlin, was kissed.

"In life, proud Albert Einstein had
To lose his job and homes.
Perhaps I'll tell of these more sad
Events in later poems."

"Professor, please," the niece called out.
"If it won't make you weary,
Please tell me what he'd think about,
When he would make a theory."

"Oh well, I guess I can reprise
The works that Einstein made."
Then Herzfeld tried to summarize;
And this is what he said.

"One theory that young Albert made
Brought Nernst from Germany.
He went to Switzerland to trade
His thoughts on entropy.

"For Walther Nernst at old Berlin
Believed the entropy
Of solid bodies did begin
To fall at low degree.

"Nernst hoped that someday he would be
A scientific hero,
For proving that the entropy
At last would drop to zero.

"Now Einstein's thought of quantum springs,
Like springs within a bed,
Implied that possibly all things
When cold, were as he said.

"For as the temper'ture would drop,
The lack of energy
Would make the quantum shaking stop
And drop the entropy.

"Another topic Albert liked
To study with devotion
Was how small particles were spiked
With rapid Brownian Motion.

"In eighteen twenty seven (1827), Brown
Saw pollen grains aflitter
And published out in London town
About this curious jitter.

"He switched to inert bits of dust
And glass no life contains,
And saw them shake and jiggle just
Like life-filled pollen grains.

"And so he had then to conclude
That microscopic motion
Was not reserved to living brood
Of cells within a potion.

"Einstein showed that there was hope,
Recoil could readily,
If seen within a microscope,
Prove atomicity.

"Another field of study did
Engage Albert's strong mind;
And this was all about the way
That nature was entwined.

"Einstein's good friend was Ehrenfest,
Who visited in Prague.
The thing they liked to do the best
Was physics dialog.

"They talked all day of the quantum
And played a fine duet.
Mileva fixed the tea for them
And had the table set.

"To Al, the man, who made most sense,
Hailed from the Holland nation.
He was Heinricht Antoon Lorentz
And made a transformation.

"In Berlin City there lived Planck,
Who found the action "h."
He is the one that we must thank
For all the quantum rage.

"Minkowski was the scientist,
Who read Einstein's invention,
And was the one to first insist
On time, the fourth dimension.

"At Gottingen, he was employed
With Klein and David Hilbert.
And there the youthful Born enjoyed
The talk of this great expert.

"But it was not too long until
Minkowski met a crisis.
Within four months he grew quite ill
And died—appendicitis!

"When Einstein said that light quanta
Comprise a beam of light,
The scientists said they want a
Good way to prove it right.

"But finally the questions stayed
And every doubt was stompted on,
After some carbon was x-rayed
By Arthur Holly Compton.

"The scattering of the x-rays
Obeyed his fine equations,
For Einstein did predict its ways
With energy relations.

"Most men connect a great theory
With Einstein's name the most.
It's known as relativity
And tells how objects coast.

"The special relativity
From which he draws his fame.
Prescribes how Maxwell's Laws should be
Expressed on reference frames.

"For if the laws that govern light
In two frames are the same,
The speed of light in both are right
And equal speed obtains.

"To keep the speed of a light beam
The same in moving frames
Required a most unheard of scheme
That intuition shames.

"For making this relation stick
Requires that clocks don't run
The same; but they must slower tick
On moving frames. By gum!

"And lengths upon the moving frame
Are shorter than at base.
You'd think they all should be the same;
But this is not the case.

"And when the new relationship,
To motion, is applied,
Rest energy we do unzip
And find, with mass, supplied.

"The next elaboration of
This relativity
Was to acceleration's shove
Applied to gravity.

"For it is still a big question
Why Newton's gravity
Produces just the same motion
In all identically.

"This relationship is strong.
The mass, they call inertial
To every object does belong
And equals gravitational.

"Just why this is, they do not know
And wonder quite a bit
 About the reason why it's so
That different things so fit.

"While Albert could not understand
The reason they're the same,
He readily accepted; and
Began his thought to frame.

"Then he considered that the case
Of gravity would be
As with accelerated space
Inside a rocket, free."

As Herzfeld just was opening up
This opus of Einstein,
The guards in blue were closing up,
The doors to shut the Shrine.

"Another time we will discuss
The General Theory
That brought the world into a fuss
As shown in history.

"The theory predicted that
Light from a distant star
Would be refracted by the sun
As it passed by, afar.

"This is observed on eclipse days,
That are indeed quite rare,
For then the moon blockades the rays
And cuts the solar glare.

"And now we need to end this tale,
So you can get to rest.
Remember that you should not fail
To try to do your best.

"For you need to recall the fact
The chosen are but few;
And heaven, those, who often act,
Their worst, will never view.

Above, the ghost of Herzfeld slipped;
And they stood there alone.
Inside the chapel of the crypt,
They prayed, then left for home.

"Oh, Uncle Frank, I'm happy now,
That Herzfeld told the story
Of Einstein; so I will know how
To overcome my worry.

"For when my sassy teacher says
To follow science blindly,
I know that this will lead to days,
When people act unkindly.

"Then I will say I do not want
To be like sad Mileva,
Who suffered sadness and the taunt
Of Elsa, her deceiver.

"But rather I would like to cure
With medicine of love,
And serve all like the great Pasteur,
Who worshipped God above."

Then Uncle Frank, with smile, replied,
"Your choice is understood.
A good example on your side
Will help all reach the good..."

Copyright Francis J. Kelly   2005

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