Ballade of an Artificial Satellite

Thence they sailed far to the southward along the land, and came to a ness; the land lay upon the right; there were long and sandy strands. They rowed to land, and found there upon the ness the keel of a ship, and called the place Keelness, and the strands they called Wonderstrands for it took long to sail by them.
      —Thorfinn Karlsefni’s voyage to Vinland, as related in the saga of Erik the Red

One inland summer I walked through rye,
a wind at my heels that smelled of rain
and harried white clouds through a whistling sky
where the great sun stalked and shook his mane
and roared so brightly across the grain
it burned and shimmered like alien sands.
Ten years old, I saw down a lane
the thunderous light on Wonderstrands.
In ages before the world ran dry,
what might the mapless not contain?
Atlantis gleamed like a dream to die,
Avalon lay under faerie reign.
Cibola guarded a golden plain,
Tir-nan-Og was fair-locked Fand’s,
sober men saw from a gull’s-road wain
the thunderous light on Wonderstrands.
Such clanging countries in cloudland lie;
but men grew weary and they grew sane
and they grew grow—and so did I—
and knew Tartessus was only Spain.
No galleons call at Taprobane
(Ceylon, with English); no queenly hands
wear gold from Punt; nor sees the Dane
the thunderous light on Wonderstrands.
Ahoy, Prince Andros Horizon’s-bane!
They always wait, the elven lands.
An evening planet gives again
the thunderous light on Wonderstrands.