Claire V. Bogdanos

Upon one night that was quiet resting

without a single star

Within that realm we cannot touch because

its contents live too far,

A comet journeyed through space and sped

across the pathway of sight

Its distant splintered trail did fail to break

the stillness of the night

And left behind for brief moments,

a sprinkling of glittering dust

Then spread itself apart in exorcise

for disappear it must.

I wonder now as I reflect upon

the scope of what I’d seen

How many a soul, who looking up has

spied that which rests between

The trembling earth and far-off heaven’s vast

and unchartered domain,

Space that exists in spite of awesome passions

in all that remain

Once where Apollo strode across the ancient

footstool of the sky

While lithesome Mercury did there his playful

lust for speech apply,

And streaked about that wide expanse mankind had

 labeled celestial,

Touching not on boundaries that are coursing

earth’s terrestial,

Yet seeming to pursue some unrestricted

end with gain supreme,

Wherein planet, moon and star react to

cycles each may redeem.

There with some complicated astronomer’s

tool to find and trace

A pattern that explains how each remembers

their specific place

Knowing one force guides this universe

with unrelenting power

Controlling the slowest movement that marks

each minute, counts each hour.

A lesson we’ve found to be constant and

true this power exists

With a will that is strong wavering not

and one plan that persists.

Search among the learning of the past while

interest piques the mind

And delving through Homer’s expertise forthwith

to some wisdom find,

Finally to conclude that man must in

his endless questing be

The simplest transiting creature that dwells

within infinity :

Let our reason be such while we follow each star

As it crests in the sky at some distance too far,

Never losing the faith that depends on our sight,

Fail to shatter the darkness which we’ll call the night

Ere time greets that moment when we pass into dust,

Know the ends of our lives are a natural must.