She had a way with numbers

In Letters from a Floating World, artist and poet Siv Cedering (1939-2007) has given us a poignant portrait of astronomer (and math-woman) Caroline Herschel:
 
Letter from Caroline Herschel (1750-1848)     by Siv Cedering

William is away, and I am minding

the heavens. I have discovered

eight new comets and three nebulae

never before seen by man,

and I am preparing an Index to

Flamsteed's observations, together with

a catalogue of 560 stars omitted from

the British Catalogue, plus a list of errata

in that publication. William says 

I have a way with numbers, so I handle

all the necessary reductions and

calculations. I also plan

every night's observation

schedule, for he says my intuition

helps me turn the telescope to discover

star cluster after star cluster.

I have helped him polish the mirrors

and lenses of our new telescope. It is

the largest in existence. Can you imagine

the thrill of turning it to some new

corner of the heavens to see

something never before seen

from earth? I actually like

that he is busy with the Royal society

and his club, for when I finish my other work

I can spend all night sweeping

the heavens.

Sometimes when I am alone

in the dark, and the universe reveals

yet another secret, I say the names

of my long, lost sisters, forgotten

in the books that record

our science —

     Aganice of Thessaly,

     Hyptia,

     Hildegard,

     Catherina Hevelius,

     Maria Agnesi

— as if the stars themselves could

remember. Did you know that Hildegard

proposed a heliocentric universe

300 years before Copernicus? that she

wrote of universal gravitation 500 years

before Newton? But who would listen

to her? She was just a nun, a woman.

What is our age, if that age was dark?

As for my name, it will also be

forgotten, but I am not accused

of being a sorceress, like Aganice,

and the Christians do not threaten to

drag me to church, to murder me, like they did

Hyptia of Alexandria, the eloquent, young

woman who devised the instruments

used to accurately measure the position

and motion of

heavenly bodies.

However long we live, life is short, so I

work. And however important man becomes,

he is nothing compared to the stars.

There are secrets, dear sister, and it is

for us to reveal them. Your name, like mine,

is a song. Write soon,

                               Caroline

Letters from the Floating World was published in 1984 by University of Pittsburgh Press.  I am grateful to poet and mathematician Sarah Glaz for alerting me to this fine poem.