Orion Nebula – photo courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/STScI
One Small Step
Hubble’s on YouTube
tele-scope it out
it’s a step inside invitation
a belly up to the Milky Way bar
and order a draft
of whatever’s on celestial tap
a blast from the past
through honeycombed glass
it’s a raucous carnival night
our blue and green bubble
afloat on the fairway
lost in the crowd
just a cell on the skin
of a universe too vast
to comprehend
nebula and quasar
tibia and fibula
somehow all connected
we are here
you are there
yet how can we be anywhere
without being aware
we’re but one microscopic dot
on the blotter of the entire universe?
hearse comes to take us
and we’re gone
while the anything but black
whole of the universe
lives on
our backwater galaxy
just a vanity
an affectation you can barely see
with the naked eye
radius and ulna
orbit and circumference
I don’t know if you can say
we belong to the universe
or it belongs to us
all our little fuss and bother
hunger and whoring for war
doesn’t affect the galaxies
one way or the other
trapezium and trapezoid
trapeze and trampoline
cluster and infrared dust
this spangled event continues
night after night
all those uncurling fists
flinging wide
their confetti
of polychromatic light
we like to think
we’re inquirers
explorers
“Indiana Jones”
Amelia Earhart
setting new records
charting unknowns
we like to feel we’re
Asimov, Hawking
Carl Sagan
mindsurfing the Cosmos
mapping the night
unraveling Einsteinian mysteries
of this ring or that moon
or some other sparkly satellite
we like to dream
we’re lifting the lid
of a sleepy god’s eye
and peering inside
we like to imagine
that we can see
behind the curtain
that we have star sight
but here we are
unmasked and marked as rubes
not so much Magellan
as Mr. Magoo
bumbling around our little system
blinded and blistered
by a golden solar spotlight
waving our umbrellas
like swords at the reign
of destruction and hate
not even noticed
as gatecrashing ants
under the Big Top of the Bang
all but invisible
wistful and wishful
our bubble world
an impermanent shimmer
ready to pop
at the drop of The Bomb
Hubble’s on YouTube
there for the asking
a blast from the past
irising open and inviting us in
one small step and we’re through
the metaphysical door
one small step and we’ve gone
where no one has gone before
and if we go exploring
we just might discover
that we’re already there
might discover ourselves
in the stardust
of what’s already here
(and whether or not
we find any Others
or they find us)
we aren’t lost
to this Universal history
but
we should consider
our tickets are punched
and we’re all of us
along for this trip
on this mindblowing
cosmic
Mobius strip
poem (c) 2011 by Dianne Borsenik — used with the poet’s permission
Dianne Borsenik 20 July 2008 at the Huron Boat Basin — photo by Jesus CrisisDianne Borsenik, a former flower child and current redhead, lives with husband James near Elyria, Ohio’s beautiful Cascade Park. She has had poems and haiku published in a number of journals and anthologies, including
Rosebud,
Slipstream,
Haiku World: An International Poetry Almanac and
The Magnetic Poetry Book of Poetry. Her two chapbooks,
HardDrive/SoftWear and
Blue Graffiti are available from Crisis Chronicles Press. With poetry partner John Burroughs, she has co-produced/co-hosted the Lix & Kix Poetry Extravaganza and Snoetry: A Winter Wordfest series. Find her at
http://www.pw.org/content/dianne_borsenik_0.
