The Laws of Planetary Motion

“We revolve around the Sun like any other planet.” 
                               — Nicolaus Copernicus


For almost a thousand years, before the discovery 
of the heliocentric universe, the shape of planetary 
orbits was believed to be a perfect circle. One 

circle stacked inside another inside another 
and another, like ampitheatre seats looking down 
on a stage in the round—where always, it was us 

strutting about, wringing our hands, pleading for one 
more day, for augury, for love or mercy. But when Galileo
peered more closely into the telescope and saw Jupiter's 

four orbiting moons, he concluded they could not 
have been there if we were indeed the center. 
Center, circle, shape of mystical symmetry:

instead we all wobble and drift, our own gravity 
sometimes speeding us up, other times slowing us down.