In Surface Tension, Colin Will dives from bellyflops to molecular bonds, exploring how water's skin holds midges aloft yet breaks beneath a diver#s fall. A lyrical blend of physics and sensation, where impact, scale, and the dance of molecules meet.
Tombstoning on the coast
or bombing at the baths
we like to make a splash.
Touching the surface we pass
straight through into liquid,
feel the smack of impact
on the part that hits first.
Which of us hasn’t felt the sting
of a bellyflop? And the faster
you fall, the harder you hit.
It’s a matter of scale; to midges
and pond-skaters the surface
is as strong as a trampoline,
hard to push through, easy to slide on.
At the lowest level it’s a balance of forces
at the interface between air and water.
Below there’s a dance of molecules,
linking and unlinking as tenuous attractions
form and unform, holding water together.
Electrons, each a fuzzy point of charge
at the end of a leash of force,
are more stable in pairs, spinning
in opposite directions. At the top
of water, stretched in a plane,
their tiny tugs are stronger, last longer,
until a body breaks them.