Our purpose then to look beyond the sky
Turn round from Earth
And know first moon, then Mars,
Then all the stars that beckon in a field.
The yield from this?
A life and then a life and then a life;
A world and then a world and then a world.
A dream atop a dream atop more dreams.
What seems is not enough.
What is is pitiful and small and fragile-frail.
The Earth our jail? we break the lock,
Undock our starships, unfrock our older priests
To dress them in bright vestments torn from rings
That marry Saturn with vast promisings.
The East is Up!
The sun beyond our sun is there,
The Earth beyond our Earth awaits with greening land
And skies as fair as gods can plan with myths.
Earth’s shibboleths we leave behind
We go to find and touch…
(Too much! Too much!)
That great red eye, Jove’s best,
That scans us as we pass and blinks: “Get on!”
The dawn we seek is an eternal dawn—
Real heavens that we promise to ourselves
Instead of plaster angels on high shelves.
We run from death, and if our flight is fast
Life wins the game of time.
And death?
Left lost, comes late—forever last.