You get a fix on the instruments, a place to hang
the calculations, something to mingle with
motive and map, the slap down tabling
the winning hand, the algorithm laying it on
thick to keep the machine busy, the star
at last found to further the reason
this sojourn continues sojourning along—
all these heroes minted to get sent stepping,
the stories still warm around the fire
burning all these light years away,
a destination for all those questions
left cluttering up the tables and rattling
around the drawers. The kitchen
music, low voices and the clatter of
limbs and dishes, all the missing
intimacies and unknown social occasions.
Listen, it makes sense to throw the stick so far,
the fetching made of generations, civilizations
spent in the time the keening is named and
denied, pushing through the problem,
leaving the words to blind the eyes of
star struck posterity, the gazed on constellation
turning destiny into destination, the empty stall
and broken tether found out,
history comes crashing down
debris and exposition now
a fixed star halo,
the dream folded over into pretty pictures
adrift on the scent of the rain kissed earth.