~
Rigel

Art thou
Thy soul
Of souls
Reaching
O to thee?

Or that
Celestial
Tide thus
Brimming
So, most
Delightful
Beams o'er
Me?
~

Sirius

O, Yes!
My Bride-to-be,
Spinning fiercely
Like a dervish in
This galaxy!
~

Rigel

My flames! My core!
Held together by my
Own attractiveness, I
Assure, I need not thee
Tis myself I do adore!
Fantastic mysteries
I keep thus pure!

Woo me to Love?
You seem assured
Of your Self as well!
But you must make
Haste to hence take
This, my body, O!
Heretofore to meld.
~

Sirius

My lust forsaken
Broken, taken!

See how hot
These fires
Thus burn,
All my Love
To you I turn!
~

Rigel

Be gone!
Be gone!
My Love
Must be earned.
~

Sirius

O what woe!
Woebegone
And melancholy!
Ease my malady,
Be my Lady!
~

Rigel

Perhaps one day
I shall, but as of
Now, I turn
Thee away.
~

Sirius

I shall do
My utmost
To burn
So close
Today
Tomorrow
So perhaps
Someday
It will be so.
~

Rigel silently

*Sigh, you
Persistent thing;
I wish to cradle
You, soon too.

You: A nebula.
Vast and far-reaching.
Ionized gasses, pink and blue
An ode to passion, and depth.
You. Are. Unfathomable.
Nestled in your tendrils,
A cosmic safe harbor,
I am born a star.
Consuming your words like hydrogen,
I shine bright,
Radiating warmth into the cosmos.

I want to jump off the earth and into space
As vast visions of knowledge graze my face
Laplace's demon I wish to be
But that hypothetical is not me
To witness planets and stars humans never see
Floating in space will set me free
Milky Way, Andromeda, perhaps a Magellanic cloud
Vega, Rigel, and Altair are my shroud
Antares and Arcturus burning up high
Adara and Bellatrix in my night sky
Life like Eridanus, the end is Achernar
So beautiful up close, and from afar
Horologium watching my every move
To Hydrus and Leo, my courage I must prove
Sun Ra taught me that "Space Is The Place"
When I journey forth, Ill shall adventure with grace

they moved as they always have
with stumbling scraping steps
that gradually become less confused

my first memory was their eyes
pale, strangely large, filled with hunger, searching
and their hair floating wild in the night
echoing their desperate movements

now I see them emerging from the fogs of memory
their waving hands long fingered
with nails like claws
turning their heads from side to side seeking
stumbling down the darkened passages
tortured

when they found the moon
they scorned it
rejected the pale ghost of the sun
they wanted nothing less than the great furnaces of the skies
Aldebaran, Deneb, Altair, Rigel, Alpha-Centari
but they searched in tunnels far from the freedom of the night
leading to false paradigms and delusional discoveries
where they expected unrefuted clarity
they exposed schemes and lies
still they searched until their strength was almost done
until, at the penultimate door
in terror, they found themselves.

From the Illustrated Zombies 2010

around the turn of the year
  Orion looks at me
   head on
on my little loggia

the brilliance of the sky
in a clear winter night
is awesome
and even if I did not
   know the names of the stars
   that give Orion shape
Rigel, Betelgeuse

I would start wondering
about design and meaning
and how I figure in it
    if at all

   whether my astronomer friends
   have terms and explanations
   does not really matter

   it is I
   who has to come to terms
   with what I see    

with the endlessness
   of the universe
the brilliance of its appearance
and the feeling that
   in all of this
my own insignificance
might be
just that

You remember that cow they told us about?
The one that jumped over the moon?
Well.
It never came back.
It’s hind legs were so powerful,
it’s hooves so sturdy
that he jumped from here,
on earth,
all the way over the moon.
All the way through the asteroid belt
past Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune
and even Pluto,
that tiny little sphere of ice
those *** holes at the International Astronomical Union
declassified as a planet in 2006.
The cow died before it got there though.
Maybe because there’s no oxygen in space
though I’ll never be certain.
But his body kept on floating.
Still propelled by the force it left earth with:
a dead black and white cow
sailed out of our solar system
and into the Arm of Orion.
But the light from Rigel and Betelgeuse
chased him away.
Blue-white and red supergiants have that effect on people.
Or cows.
Even dead cows.
And so, our travelling hero, who I’ve now named Frank,
spiralled through 0-gravity
and ended up
on the other side of the Milky Way.
Cygnus. Cygnus’ Arm is what caught him.
Cygnus and Frank became good friends.
Who could imagine!?
A dead cow and swan made of stars!
How preposterous.
But eventually they spread apart
(as all friendships eventually do)
and so Frank was left without a companion
and drifted off through space once more.
And we haven’t heard from him since.

I let my dog out back and watch him
because it’s cold out and I’m
not wearing a shirt
my arms are crossed and I watch
as he disappears in the inky blackness
and I turn to the sky


Mintaka Alnilam Alnitak
eyes drawn to Sirius
and back
to Betelgeuse and Bellatrix
Rigel Saiph
The Pleiades, and
I like to pretend I can find
Procyon


My ******* and my hands press closer
to the glass, and it is freezing
yet my eyes are locked on the left of
Orion,
at a star I don’t know
nearly blinding with its luminosity
a planet, but one I do not know
and it thrills me


This is how planets are discovered
I think
anomalies in the sky that
make man wonder
it is bright and beautiful and my face is
against the window
my breath fogs the glass
yet still I see the nameless Star—
and I open the door, to bring myself
closer, to war the cold
in hopes that being near will
fill me with knowledge and that
elusory star will tell me its name


And my dog, invisible in the night,
jumps back from the door and looks
reproachfully at me
and I stare at that gorgeous sky
and my naked skin is already shivering
and my arms cross against my chest
as I turn and go back
inside,
staring at the Pleiades and Orion,
and that white-hot star
once more.

(Polaris)

~

a dark night sky,
horizon to horizon,
see countless stars,
some call it billions,
i count by myriads...
cast an upward gaze,
in any direction,
so stunningly beautiful;
and though so many nameless,
and so many faceless,
are they not noteworthy all,
still each and every one?

yet, but a few,
like Sirius, like Schedar,
like Regulus and Rigel,
in number a few dozen more;
in all are counted fifty-seven,
star sisters, sun brothers
thought bright enough,
placed precisely, just,
to be among those sought  
between clouds by ocean sailors;
with squinted gaze perused
by desert navigators;
in constellations scanned,
relentlessly pursued,
by travelers the globe across.

you, my love are such a star
your rising luminescence
far too brilliant to ignore;
in present station,
your presenting position,
not merely making bright;
for tis you, my love,
who makes the night
alive, arise with life;
for without your zenith,
my bearing is lost...
take away my north,
no others align!

in this darkening sky.
i could n’er visualize
your brilliance gone dim,
nor being without
your guiding light,
beckoning my hand;
for it is by you
that i set my compass,
and in you that
i lay my course.

Polaris...
high and afar,
my true north;
and for’er you are,
my sight-guiding,
night-lighting,
heart-binding,
northern star!

~

post script.

terrestrially speaking... yes, i do know that those beneath the equatorial center will use a navigational star guide list different entire, but they and theirs are not within sight of these eyes. no offense intended; i can but write of mine.

celestially speaking... navigators of old knew the fifty-seven stars, plus one (Polaris) by which to plot their course. one wonders if the art has been entirely lost with today’s extensive dependence on satellite navigation and global positioning systems.  the time may come when we will wish for a return to the sky for direction.

ethereally speaking... tis but a metaphor to paint a horizon-stretching tapestry of the binding and guiding power of one light to another, one heart to another’s.  yet the truth is, no metaphor will suffice, and no language has words enough to describe the mysteries, the intricacies, and the ecstasies of true love!

maritally speaking... it is thirty-seven years ago this week that we made vows; swore our faithfulness one to another.  she has been the core that held me, even when for a season our gravitational pull grew weak, yet she held firm.  neither has ever betrayed the other, yet i owe her my life, because i am the impetuous and she the more gracious.

i lay down my
vanities
like
oranges
at the altar.
i pour out my
pride like water
from the Krishna-
sodden ribbon of faith
runs around and over and
through your hands
and i lay down my
face on your lap
and i lay down my face
on your map of the world
and the oceans whisper under my ear
and the future
is a boxer inside of your chest
throwing fist-
bom, bom
after fist-
bom bom
at the shadows on the wall.
and i lay my faces down
all five of them-
six of them.
and i lay them down to
be eaten by the dogs.
while they chew merry on my
presentations, my false introductions.
i look to the night sky of your face
and it looks like it may rain.
sorrow rain. snowflake fractals falling on my
cheek-
great rivers of regret and sorrow
and restraint.
i look up
Rigel Kentaurus
is shining from somewhere deep inside.
and i find you, and i find my way
around the black hole
inside you and i move swift around the comet that is me.
fire, fire, pieces of planets and fire
fiercely forcing it's way through the universes until
i finally hit
a force stronger than i.
i shed my clothes.
as naked is the eyes that see me, true.
i shed my pride.
as forgiving is the soul that nurtures.
i wear your adoration like cherry blossoms blooming
i wear your eyes, i take them from you
to see me,
to see me
and i do not disappoint. i am naked and beautiful and modest
just as you said i would be.
beautiful vessel
the Gods choose well,
so i lay my silks and finery at your feet.
blossoms in the sacrificial bowl.
let me lay, just a little longer,
on your lap that is the world
let me lay here
while your hand of the softest gossimer fingertips
rides the bumps in my spine.
let me find myself in your lush silence
and in this divine be forgiven-
oh! That I find myself forgiven.

sahn
1/19/2015

Cheerio, cheerio
Four AM they call to keep the awake awake
And lull the slumbering deeper adream

Clutching vapors of the musky night
Cool, humid, starry eve
Betelgeuse humming a tune

Rigel entranced by the melody
Alnitak, Alnilam, Mintaka belting along
While the nightbirds

While away the hours, embedded
Deep in the canopy of springtime maples
And chirp, and chirp, and chirp the expanse

Singsonging to insomniacs
******* of blue, red, orange, all grey
Parading the atomic clock onward

And every night they chirrup
Never before two o’clock- why at such a time
As the deadzone of slumbering night?

And there goes the first
Cheerio, cheerio
Good night, good morning nightbirds.

She is the most attentive person
That I know. So I am winking
At her.

I do not really know
Which star at night
Reminded me of her
Just like before.
Sirius, Rigel, Vega, Aldebaran--
I do not recall a star that--
That does not look back,
She cannot see me anymore,
Just looking, staring at her,
This way. God,
She's so beautiful.

She is the harpist of my life.
She feels more than ever.
She longs for shapes, sizes, and textures.
What a cute baby...
Her hand is fond
Of my hand, memorizing
The intricate lines and features,
Telling my future.
You can tell what she really is.
She smiles despite of.

She is literally wind, monsoon,
Literal dark and light,
A soul, a window.
She is literally blind.
She is literally love.

She is the most attentive love
That I know.*

© 2014 J.S.P.