John Nimmo: “I’m a scientist, specializing in the physics of environmental systems. And I’m a poet who loves using words to confront the material and immaterial, or what is obvious with what is self-contradictory. Most of the time I’m in Menlo Park, California, where I live with my wife Elsa. Sometimes I conduct field experiments in exotic tropical or desert locations, or, more frequently, at major hazardous waste sites. In poetry and in scientific research, there is always more to write about or to investigate, and no reason why the results of the creative effort cannot surpass the heights achieved before. These two realms relate in ways that are asymmetric but wonderfully strange and complementary. Experiencing poetry leads me to pursue the unexpected, recognize and nurture multiple levels of meaning, and expand mentally by grappling with divergent modes of reasoning—poetry makes me a better scientist.” (web)
