What is Research?

I transfer microliters of solution
to a tube environed with bacteria

I slide the slab of gel from here to
there

I lower the fine tip of the pipette
to the flesh of the brain
and inject

This
This is science
This is research

But what of the research
of an Autumn when the trees undress themselves in flames:
I learned that everything dies;
of a Winter walk through the drowning snow:
I learned that Nature always defaults to loneliness;
of a Spring trudge through the eventide sky:
I learned that not even the Earth is free of its shadow;
of a Summer evening drinking bottled beer on the roof:
I learned where to find joy.

As it is with the fine-tuned microscope,
imaging infinitesimal phenomena,
so it is with the lived experience
of each new day.