  The gravitational field of a laser pulse of finite lifetime, is investigated
in the framework of linearized gravity. Although the effects are very small,
they may be of fundamental physical interest. It is shown that the
gravitational field of a linearly polarized light pulse is modulated as the
norm of the corresponding electric field strength, while no modulations arise
for circular polarization. In general, the gravitational field is independent
of the polarization direction. It is shown that all physical effects are
confined to spherical shells expanding with the speed of light, and that these
shells are associated with the emission and absorption of the pulse. Nearby
test particles at rest are attracted towards the pulse trajectory by the
gravitational field due to the emission of the pulse, and they are repelled
from the pulse trajectory by the gravitational field due to its absorption.
Examples are given for the size of the attractive effect. It is recovered that
massless test particles do not experience any physical effect if they are
co-propagating with the pulse, and that the acceleration of massless test
particles counter-propagating with respect to the pulse is four times stronger
than for massive particles at rest. The similarities between the gravitational
effect of a laser pulse and Newtonian gravity in two dimensions are pointed
out. The spacetime curvature close to the pulse is compared to that induced by
gravitational waves from astronomical sources.
